


Last of the Wilds

by Shaish, Stringlish



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: A/B/O, Amnesia, Because werewolves, Brief Steve/Tony, Foul Language, Foul talking, From one character in particular, Gen, Gore, Happy Ending, Identity Porn, M/M, Mpreg, Sam bakes a lot and has an affinity for pumpkin spice, Sensitive situations and subjects, So there will be some of that, Soft Steve, Violence, Werewolf AU, Werewolves, it's not a romantic relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-03
Packaged: 2018-02-23 11:36:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 30
Words: 117,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2546117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shaish/pseuds/Shaish, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stringlish/pseuds/Stringlish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>We're all wolves with sharp teeth and gentle hearts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lungs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Stringlish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stringlish/gifts), [Mari_Knickerbocker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mari_Knickerbocker/gifts).



> I wasn't going to post this yet but I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with it and it's HALLOWEEN. And I feel the need to post something for Halloween.
> 
> Story Playlist: https://play.spotify.com/user/shaisht/playlist/5IdwLpyuBp37EoWgPQWDgK
> 
> I'm gifting/dedicating this story to Stringlish (Kay) and Mari_Knickerbocker. They've encouraged and inspired and delighted me, and made this story that much more pleasurable to write. Thank you very much. <3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #guesswhofinallyknowswhatthefuckthey'redoing

“Open it.”

There’s a long _hiss_ , coolant shooting out both sides of the pod, the small window near the top fogging over as the temperature changes. After five minutes, the pod opens with another, shorter _hiss_ , chamber lid lifting, metal gleaming under fluorescent light.

The asset’s right hand twitches and its eyes flutter open halfway, mouth working slowly before it lurches. Two guards catch it by the arms and pull it out. 

Its legs are unsteady and they hold it up for a moment before easing it quickly to the floor and stepping away, hands resting near their guns.

The asset’s eyes slowly drift around.

“Status report,” the man orders. The asset’s eyes drag up to him, steadily focusing.

It shifts on its knees to face the man directly, head bowed a little and eyes just to the man’s left, hands on its thighs, heedless of its nudity.

Its hearing is quickly clearing. Eyesight currently at eighty-percent. Arm-

It flexes its metal fingers, focuses and extends them into claws.

Functional. Scent-

It sniffs at the air faintly, catches a whiff of-

The men around it smell like fear. It’s familiar-

No. 

Nothing is familiar.

“All systems operational,” it answers, retracting its claws, voice rough and scratchy and a wisp of a thing, not yet done thawing.

The man smiles.

 

“Good.”

The asset does not reply.

\-----

“You’ve been asleep for seventy years, Cap.”

Steve looks around, eyes focusing on a point that’s not there.

“You going to be okay?”

He takes a moment before saying-

“Yeah,” because it’s what they’ll want to hear, except- “Why are you calling me ‘Cap’?” he asks, turning back around, “I…I can’t remember,” he realizes.

Something like shock flashes across the man’s face, easy to see in his one eye, but it’s too quick for Steve to be completely sure.

\--

“What is your name?” the woman asks half an hour later, pen poised over paper and brown eyes on his. They’re gentle, not sharp like-

He glances down.

Her skirt is narrow and uncomfortable looking, material stiff with very little give. He’s fairly sure she wouldn’t be able to _run_ in it. Running is _important_ -

She smells sweet, like the maple of a tree, with cinnamon and something spiced-

“Steve,” he answers.

She jots something down, the pen tip scratching on paper sharp in his ears.

“What are you?” she asks next, heartbeat steady.

He looks down at his right hand, flexes it and watches the stretch of skin over crooked bones, the sharpened nails looking like claws when he curls them.

Steve looks back up.

“Werewolf,” he answers.

He knows that much.

He hears her breath pick up a little.

\--

“It’s called the ‘Dream Dive’,” the man- Director Fury tells him, after his forty minutes with the female agent while they make their way down the white hall, “It activates during the REM cycle of sleep to target areas of the brain involved in memory to stimulate the system, get things back when they don’t come back on their own.”

“What if they do come back on their own?” Steve asks, the six other pairs of boots following them like a march in his ears, _one-two, one-two, one-two, squeak-squeak, squeak-squeak, squeak-squeak_ on the cement.

They come to a stop in front of a dull blue, metal door. 

Fury turns to look at him. “We had you scanned, shortly after you came out of the ice,” he says. 

Steve holds himself still, bracing for- For whatever comes next. He’s not sure he likes the idea of them doing things to him while he was unaware.

“Due to the impact of the plane crash, it’s unlikely your amnesia is going to dissipate on its own,” Fury states, “This may be one of our only options at present.”

Steve takes that in.

“So I won’t remember anything before today,” he states, and his voice manages not to shake. If he doesn’t remember anything already, it shouldn’t make him so nervous thinking about not getting anything back. He’s a blank slate, free of...well, most things, except for ‘ _Captain America_ ’ it would seem ( _and who names anything **that?**_ ).

“Basically,” Fury replies, “You might remember a few things here and there, but you’ll mostly be a new person.”

Which is fine, really. He doesn’t know what he’s missing so he can’t miss it. Except-

Except he _is_ uncomfortable not knowing. What if he forgot something important about what he is? What if he left someone _behind?_ If it really _is_ seventy years into the future ( _and he believes that, because New York had felt...like a completely different **world**_ ) and they’re long gone, or about seventy years his senior now, he still…

Or if he’s left things unfinished. If he’s forgotten something important ( _like **everything**_ ).

They told him the gist of his ‘story’. His life. That there was someone named ‘Peggy’ and someone named ‘Bucky’ and something called the ‘Howling Commandos’ and showed him pictures that meant nothing to him and said they were important to him, once. That he fought in an important war long past with a group of men that was crucial in turning the tides in their favor. That he was a hero ( _and that very, very few people knew what he was beneath that_ ).

They haven’t had time to talk much, and Steve’s not sure he trusts them to not do anything while he’s under, but-...

But he _needs_ to know.

Fury takes his silence as an answer and pulls the door open, leading the way inside even while Steve subtly sniffs at the air, ignoring the looks he can feel from his guards.

It’s a simple room: a cot built into the far end of the wall, a bathroom with no door diagonally opposite it in the left hand corner, and four, white walls. It smells... _potently_ clean. Sterile.

A tremor starts in his left hand and he curls the fingers a little before stretching them out, trying to halt it.

Fury looks up from it to him.

Steve doesn’t say anything.

“You’ll be in here for the next two days,” Fury says, and Steve nods a little warily, “Food will be brought to you, and a change of clothes. The bathroom has a shower, toilet, and sink. Everything a person needs.”

“It’s a cage,” Steve finds himself saying. Fury’s expression eases a little, and part of Steve is surprised.

“It is,” Fury replies, not denying it, “And a damn sturdy one. Can you handle that?”

Steve stares at him for a moment before nodding again and Fury nods back.

“Good. Shall we get started?”

\-----

“Designation.”

“Winter Soldier,” it answers, lifting the rifle and checking the sight.

“Target?” its handler asks.

“Confirmed,” it answers. The men around it still smell like fear, the scent itself fami-

“Good,” its handler replies, clapping it once, gently on the shoulder. 

Assessment: Informal gesture. Something done between individuals familiar with one another or as a display of subtle dominance. Ownership. 

No action necessary.

“Shall we get started?” its handler asks.

The asset picks up its mask and slides it into place.

\-----

Steve lays down on the cot, tiny machine made of three, narrow pieces of metal and four, blue circles in place, the metal... _form fitting_ and secure on his head, across his forehead.

“Close your eyes,” a female voice instructs from somewhere in the ceiling. Steve does. “We will begin in three, two, one.”

Steve takes a steadying breath-

_He runs. Through the snow on the ground and the forest around him, breath coming out in quick, hot puffs of air that blow away like he’s the wind. His chest rises and falls in quick succession, bare skin overheated and bare feet crunching the snow and twigs underfoot, legs and blood pumping, the sounds of animals skittering away in his ears and hair wild._

_Steve catches a scent and skids to a stop, quickly darting off in the direction it’s coming from._

_He grins._

_It only takes moments and then they **collide** , Steve tackling him to the ground and both of them rolling with the force of it in a tangle of bare limbs, then rolling with the attempts to get the other pinned, like two cubs playing in tall grass._

_Steve gets him pinned first and grins victoriously down at him, canines a little longer and all of his teeth a little sharper, knows his eyes are glowing bright even in the day._

_Bucky smirks back up at him, kicking one of Steve’s legs out to throw him off balance and switch their positions, grinning down at Steve’s surprised face, his own teeth just as sharp and his own eyes just as bright, grayer and lighter in shade._

_“Yer gettin’ rusty there, Stevie,” he teases._

_Steve lets out a snort before moving in a blur, flipping them again and smirking down at Bucky._

_“ **Uh-huh** ,” he replies playfully, pushing himself up in one quick movement and running off towards the sound of running water._

_He hears Bucky let out a bark of sound somewhere between surprise and a laugh before pushing himself up and taking off after him, the cold of winter left behind. “That’s cheatin’, Rogers!” he calls out._

_“ **Uh-huh!** ” Steve sasses back over his shoulder, knows Bucky can hear the grin in his voice._

_“ **You little shit!** ” Bucky yells ahead, but Steve can hear he’s grinning too. He’ll catch Steve._

_Bucky always does._

_\--_

_They both pant, crouched at a stream. Bucky leans forward, down on his hands, and dunks his head in the water, long, sharp nails digging into the earth. He pulls back up with a gasp and shakes his hair out, sending water flying in every direction._

_Steve snorts and sees Bucky look over at him out of the corner of his eye before doing the same, nails equally long digging into the snowy ground, dunking his own head into freezing water. He pulls back, shakes his own hair out while Bucky closes an eye and lifts an arm to try and block the flung out drops._

_“What? Were ya raised in a **barn?** ” Bucky teases._

_Steve snorts again, crouching back on his haunches, elbows resting on his bare thighs as he looks over, water slipping down with drying sweat along his skin. Steve raises an unimpressed eyebrow back. “Uh-huh,” he says again, expression flat but lips twitching up at the sides._

_Bucky leans down again and scoops a quick hand into the water to fling it up in Steve’s direction._

_Steve laughs, blocking some of it with his own hand acting as a small shield._

_Bucky lets out a long breath, crouching back on his own haunches. “You wanna?” he asks, looking over at him._

_Steve’s expression sobers and he looks back._

_“We shouldn’t, Buck,” he says after a moment, “There’s hunters out. It’s not **safe**.”_

_Bucky makes a small, noncommittal sound, looking out across the stream at the packed, bare trees across it._

_Steve watches him._

_“It’ll be alright,” Bucky says, looking back over at Steve, “There’s plenty of cover. And we can just shift back if we hear anything. We’ll be **fine**.”_

_Steve’s brows draw together, uncertain, eyes darting out across the stream to the other half of the forest on the other side. He looks back to Bucky after a moment, letting out a sigh, because Bucky’s going to do it whether he goes along or not. Not out of spite, just...Steve knows he likes the feeling. Running free and wild without a care. Steve does too, if he’s being honest, he’d just like to live long enough to keep **doing** it._

_Bucky’s already standing up because Steve’s sigh gives everything away. He knows Steve too well._

_“Alright,” Steve says anyway, taking the hand Bucky offers down to him to let Bucky haul him up, “But we stick together. And we hear **anything** , we change back.”_

_“Yessir,” Bucky says with a cocky grin and a lazy salute. Steve can’t help his lips curving up again, even while trying to keep his face serious._

_Bucky shifts first, Steve following shortly after, bones stretching and snapping and rearranging, skin growing fur and muzzles elongating out, teeth lengthening a little more, sharpening._

_It hurts, **a lot** , but it’s worth it. It’s **always** worth it._

_By the end of it, Steve’s staring down at dark brown and blonde front legs, wolf form four feet tall and six feet long, sees his eyes are a soft but electric blue glow in the water’s surface. He looks over._

_Bucky’s a dark brown mass next to him, just an inch or two shorter, blue-gray eyes like lights in the white of the snow._

_Bucky swishes his tail in Steve’s direction before taking off, Steve launching himself after right behind. They leap the stream with plenty of room to spare and dart between the trees, weaving and crossing each other’s paths with the world speeding by in a blur._

_This is where Steve’s happiest, with Bucky by his side, the earth beneath his feet, and freedom in his lungs._

_Steve catches sight of sunlight reflecting off of metal halfway through their run and a shot rings out just as Bucky shoves hard into his side-_

Steve sucks in a breath while his eyes snap open, staring wide eyed up at a gray ceiling instead of a snowy forest, the smell of the sterile room quickly wiping out the smell of snow and fur and _earth_.

“Bucky,” Steve breathes, and it finally means something-


	2. I need some sleep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHY HELLO. If you are reading this story, you need to go back and read chapter one because I changed it. I finally know what I'm doing with this (I know it took forever I'm working on like 16 things fjdksl I'm a hot mess I'm sorry) and had to change it up a bit. BUT YES I think I know where I'm going with this story currently and I have scenes in my head that won't leave me alone so chapter three is already in progress. 
> 
> Sorry I'm terrible and take forever to update anything I'm working on a steady beat of about three or four things all at once and the rest sporadically. This was one of the sporadic ones that was frustrating me because I didn't know where I wanted to take it yet and I _wanted to write for it_ but didn't know _what_ I wanted to write for it BUT NOW I DO. So hopefully this will get updated more frequently now jfkdsl.
> 
> P.S. I need some sleep, too.  
> P.P.S. This post to ao3 script is a blessing I didn't have to add all the italics and bold myself I might _cry_.

“ _Ready, Captain Rogers?_ ” the female voice asks after a few minutes. 

Steve swallows.

“Steve, please,” he says, voice a little shaky. He clears it.

“ _Ready, Steve?_ ” she asks. 

He nods even though he’s not sure she can see him and closes his eyes, taking a steadying breath.

“Yes.”

_There’s another shot and they take off to the left, Steve only stumbling briefly when Bucky rams into him, a bullet skimming Steve’s right shoulder as they shoot off sharply, dodging more gunfire until they can’t hear it anymore._

_Steve can smell blood._

_They don’t stop._

_He catches sight of the familiar, abandoned barn in a field they’ve ran past countless times, closing in on it, and heads straight for it, Bucky picking up on his change of direction and following._

_They don’t slow as they close the distance, leaping over a couple fallen trees and weaving around the rest, sticking together instead of breaking apart like usual, keeping to one path instead of weaving across each others’._

_They both skid to a stop after they shoot inside the barn past it’s open doors and Steve immediately starts shifting back, bones cracking and fur shedding rapidly. His muzzle cracks loudly as it shortens while his teeth slide and click and adjust, paws stretching out into long, pale fingers and claws shortening back. Steve slams his hand down against the barn floor while he stretches out his back, spine shifting from bowed to curved and head jerking up, eyes darting to find Bucky when he hears a **pained** sound and a **thud** \- _

_Bucky’s on his back, letting out a **groan** , smell of blood thick in the air, and Steve scrambles over even while his spine is just finishing clicking into place, eyes tracking the red on the old wood and on Bucky’s skin as he moves. The smell is sharp and familiar in his nose, but this isn’t a back alley and it’s not from a fist fight._

_“ **Bucky** ,” Steve says urgently, kneeling at his side and looking over the wound above his hip, near Bucky’s left side, moving a hand to cover and put pressure on it. Bucky squirms a little, looking up. _

_“ **Get it out,** ” Bucky orders, sharp teeth gritting on a wince._

_Steve frowns at him, eyebrows pulled together and heart in his throat, teeth clenched._

_But he nods sharply and lifts his hand off the wound, lengthening his right’s nails into sharp points while setting his left hand on Bucky’s stomach, spreading his fingers out along more tanned skin and pressing Bucky firmly to the barn floor. Bucky’s breaths go shallow but slower, eyes on him._

_Steve reaches down, pinching his right thumb and forefinger together before slowly slipping his sharpened nails down into the wound, mouth flattening firmly when Bucky groans at his fingers digging in and stretching it, breath picking up but still shallow. Red squeezes out over the edges of the hole against his fingers, drips down Bucky’s side and makes the smell more potent in the air._

_Steve’s eyes go unfocused as he focuses on the sensations around his fingers, nails finally **nicking** on something solid after a minute and Steve pushes his fingers in just a little farther, jaw clenching at Bucky’s pained whine, pinching them around the small object and slowly sliding them out, pulling the bullet out and letting it drop to the floor, forgotten as he presses his hand back to the wound. _

_Steve’s head whips up and around to look over his shoulder, catching the scent of gunpowder nearer on the air, and looks back down at Bucky._

_“ **We need to go** ,” Steve says urgently. _

_Bucky grits his teeth but nods, letting Steve pull him up with a sharp grunt and help him up onto Steve’s back, arms looping around Steve’s neck over his bonier shoulders while Steve hooks his arms under Bucky’s bare legs and carries him piggy-back out of the barn._

_Steve darts his eyes around before and as he dashes across the field, keeping on the lookout while trying to ignore the sensation of blood sliding between Bucky’s skin and his own at his back, trying to get them across the open space before it can hit the grass and make them easier to track. The scent of gunpowder is still a ways off, but he won’t risk **anything** with Bucky hurt. He **can’t**._

_They make it to the trees and keep going, Steve keeping his steps light and quick and avoiding twigs and brush so they don’t make much of a sound, running with Bucky’s panting breaths and the occasional muffled groan at being jostled against the side of his neck, Bucky’s bangs brushing the back of his hair. Steve keeps his eyes straight ahead, breaths puffing out soft._

_Bucky will heal, he’ll be fine in a couple of days, but Steve’s still got fear trying to claw it’s way up from where he’s pressed it down to his gut and his heart is still lodged up somewhere in his throat, Bucky’s pained sounds bouncing around in his skull with the previous gunshots the whole way back._

_\--_

“Hello?” he calls out, after blinking up at the ceiling, memory fading to make way for the gray of it, “Miss?”

“ _My name is Agent Carter_ ,” the voice supplies, and he blinks again. The name stirs something small and vague at the back of his head. Sounds familiar. “ _Is there something you need, Steve?_ ”

“I- Yeah,” he says, focusing again, “Can you tell Fury there might be people after me.” 

A pause.

“ _Who?_ ” Agent Carter asks.

He takes a breath. 

“Hunters.”

_\--_

_“Come on, Steve, we’ll be **fine** ,” Bucky insists. _

_Steve gives him a **look**. _

_Bucky rears back, eyebrow raised. “That was **one time**.”_

_Steve keeps his expression flat and turns left down the street, heading for his apartment._

_“ **Steve!** ” Bucky calls after him. Steve hears Bucky’s footsteps jog lightly to catch up. “ **Steve** ,” he whines, bent at the waist and trying to catch Steve’s eye from his left, nudging his own hat up with a couple fingers from where it’s slipped down to his brow ridge. “ **Please**. It’s been **six months**.”_

_Steve frowns, glancing over his shoulders before saying, voice hushed and a little more vicious than he intends it to be, “And what happens if we **don’t come back this time**.” Bucky’s steps falter at the look in his eyes but he picks it back up, holding Steve’s stare. “What if you- **What if** -” Steve cuts himself off, gritting his slightly sharpened teeth. He forces himself to take a few breaths, try to calm down, teeth dulling again to something more... **human**._

_“Steve,” Bucky says, grabbing his left arm and bringing them both to a stop, turning Steve towards him. Steve keeps his eyes on the cobblestone. “ **Steve** ,” Bucky says a little softer, but no less insistent. Steve finally looks up and Bucky smiles a little. “We’re meant to **run**. I know you can feel the itch down in your bones just as badly as I can in **mine**.” Steve drops his eyes to the ground again, frowning a little more. _

_He **can** feel it. That urge to shed his clothes. His skin. To **run**._

_His sensitive ears pick up the sound of a baby crying, sharp and loud down at the other end of the block, of gum snapping in the mouths of a group of kids crossing the street, of a vendor selling oranges, of a woman in a flapper dress laughing something like trickling glass at the words of a young man whose arm she’s hanging off of._

_And it drives him **crazy**._

_But still._

_Steve looks up at Bucky’s face from under the edge of his own hat, at the hope and longing in his eyes, at the **thrumming** Steve can feel him practically **radiating** , the one he knows he’s radiating **too** , but he **can’t** -_

_“ **No** , Bucky,” Steve says firmly, shaking his head even as Bucky’s face falls, “I can’t- You- Last time you- I lost my **ma** like that, Buck. I can’t go through it again. Not with you, too,” he finishes quieter, eyes dropping to the ground. She’s been gone a year and a half now and Bucky’s all he has **left**. Steve **can’t** lose him, **too**._

_“ **Steve** ,” Bucky says, gentle but firm._

_Steve reluctantly looks up, eyebrows pulled together and shoulders slumped._

_Bucky lets out a sigh, reaching up to grip his shoulder with a hand and squeezing gently. “We can go to a different forest. Upstate New York is **filled** with’em. It won’t be like last time.”_

_Steve sighs quietly after a moment, head turning to look down at the people crossing the block’s road at the end of the street. “But, Buck-” he says quietly. Bucky turns his head back around with a couple fingers on his chin, dragging Steve’s eyes back to him._

_“ **Please** , Steve. For me?” Bucky asks softly. Steve stares at him and Bucky stares back. Steve finally lets out a conceding breath._

_“ **Alright** ,” Steve says a little quieter. Bucky perks up a bit and Steve rushes to add on, “But a **different** forest. Not the same one.”_

_“Of course, Stevie,” Bucky agrees easily, pulling Steve close into his side with an arm looped around his shoulders, suspenders digging a little into Steve’s shoulder at the angle. “A different forest.”_

_Steve huffs out a quiet breath, but that something coiled tight in his chest lets itself loose a little at the promise of **running**. Of **freedom**. Even if the knot in his stomach doesn’t let up any._

_\--_

“ _Is there anything else you can tell us?_ ” Fury asks through the speakers.

Steve lets his eyes go a little unfocused. “I was born in 1902.”

_\--_

_They take a bus up as close to the forest they’ve picked as they can a week later, knees knocking together as it jostles over uneven roads and eventually dirt, getting off at the last stop. Their hands slide over metal poles and the small stairwell railing, warm from the bus’ heating._

_They take in deep breaths of cold air as their shoes hit the snow and the tantalizing hint of nature drifts towards them on the wind, cheap hats blocking the sun from their eyes._

_Bucky grins over at him and Steve lets out a quiet breath, lips twitching up involuntarily in a small smile as the fresh air in his lungs soothes some of his nerves, gripping Bucky’s hand when Bucky offers it and letting Bucky tug him in the direction both of their noses lead them._

_They walk into the forest a good distance before shedding their clothes and setting them in a pile at the base of a tree when they check the air for scents and listen for any human sounds, taking off into the forest and changing a few minutes later when they find none, snow beneath their feet and cold air suffusing their lungs._

_Steve grins and Bucky grins back before they shift, and they run._

_\--_

“I led the Howling Commandos after I rescued the 107th.”

( _Rescued Bucky_ ).

_\--_

_It’s 1930 and they move without incident, when the ‘roaring twenties’ (and don’t think Bucky didn’t get a kick out of **that** monicker) are over and a new decade is starting, and the neighbors are starting to give them **looks**. _

_Steve still looks eighteen and Bucky still looks twenty, even though he’s younger than Steve by two years. He grew bigger than Steve, faster, and Steve doesn’t think he’ll ever be as tall or as broad, even if he’s slowly finally starting to slip out of ‘runt’ territory._

_“ **Give it time, Stevie** ,” Bucky always says with one side of his lips raised higher than the other. From anyone else, it’d be mean, but from Bucky, Steve knows he means it, so he just huffs and Bucky grins._

_\--_

_And everything’s fine until-_

_\--_

_Red, red, so much red- A sharp, all consuming **pain** \- _

_A bone chilling **growl** -_

_\--_

_The wind whips his hair, train almost unbearably **loud** in his ears. His right hand spasms and he can’t grip Bucky’s **tight enough** -_

 

His eyes snap open and he sits straight up with a yell, can almost hear it echoing back long after he stops. He lifts his right hand and looks down at it.

He curls his fingers into a fist, can’t close it all the way because his fingers are a little too long, a little crooked and jagged. He lifts his smooth, dull nailed left and looks between them both. 

Steve blows out a breath, shaking his head a little and lowering his hands, pushing the flimsy blanket off and turning on the cot to face the door, subtly scenting the air a little, ears catching the sound of approaching steps. 

The door opens thirty seconds later and a woman walks in, hair outlined gold in the backlight until the room’s ( _cell’s_ ) lights flicker on, lighting her up.

“Rough night Dive, Captain Rogers?” she asks.

“Agent Carter,” he returns, not answering the question. She already knows. She’s been instructing him for two days now.

Her lips curve up a little in a smile, a glint in her eye, and she walks close enough to set down another set of clothes on the cot, movements casual but controlled. He can smell her hesitation, but she’s careful about concealing it. It’s not as prevalent as it was the last time she was in here, either.

“Let’s get you out of this room,” she says after she backs up, “I’ll give you two minutes to change.”

And then she’s gone and the door is closing again ( _this time without the six locks sliding into place_ ).

Steve pushes himself up and takes off the Dive head gear, grabs the hem of his sweaty shirt and pulls it up and over his head, dog tags _clinking_ back down to his chest.

If they think he’s not going to get any more memories back, he might as well keep trying in a place that doesn’t smell like fear and sweat and cold cement.

\--

He’s led up to floors of the building he hasn’t been to yet, and the people they pass all stare at his hand when they bother to look down and notice or catch sight of it. 

Steve forces himself not to fidget. 

It’s not embarrassment, or even the kind of discomfort that deserves the small amount of pity Agent Carter gives him briefly over her shoulder. No one likes their war wounds shown, or their personal scars, and for him, it’s both, on top of a neon sign that points directly at him saying ‘ _not human_ ’ and ‘ _hunt me_ ’.

He needs it covered.

Agent Carter knows it stands out, she’d stared at it for a moment herself when they first met, which means she was ordered not to give him a glove. He’s supposed to stand out.

He wants to know why.

“How is Peggy?” he asks, mostly to be polite. He still can’t remember much about her, just that in the flashes he saw, he was struck with something like a match lit deep in his chest, something that quickly scorches and then settles like a low fire.

“She’s been doing better these past few days,” Carter replies, giving him a smile over her shoulder. 

She doesn’t ask him again to think about stopping by to visit her aunt, but he thinks about it all the same.

Agent Carter finally stops at a door towards the end of the hall they’re on and opens it for him. He steps into a room, a large office, at least seven times the size of his old apartment back in-

 _Back_.

Fury’s sat at the large, impersonal desk set back by the large windows, and he swivels his chair around before standing up when they approach.

“Sorry about that little show,” he says, and Steve just manages not to snort.

“No, you’re not,” he replies easily, and Fury’s lips twitch, “Was it a test?”

“Yes and no,” Fury replies, gesturing to the couch and adjacent chair by the opposite wall before rounding his desk, after he dismisses Carter. 

Steve walks over and takes a seat, back straight and hands resting on his knees. Fury sits in the chair.

“It’s a test for everyone who sees it,” Fury says, casually leaning back.

“To see if they’ll try to take my head off or sell me to the highest bidder,” Steve says more than asks, fingers of his right hand twitching slightly.

“Something like that,” Fury settles on, sitting forward again and steepling his fingers, “We’ve managed to divert a few of what you called ‘hunters’ off your scent. Found a few people poking around, but it wasn’t many.”

“It wouldn’t be,” Steve replies, glancing towards the windows for a moment before looking back, “Not openly.”

Fury raises an eyebrow. “As you’ve said in between Dive sessions. I have to say, I’m not a fan of hunting down secret societies.”

“The illuminati must make you a wet blanket, then,” Steve tries to joke. Fury’s other eyebrow rises a little and Steve glances back to the window, then makes a show of looking around the room to change the topic. “Big room,” he says, ignoring the prickle of unease. He’s standing out. Hates it. But he carries on. “This is just your _office?_ Swear my apartment went the length of that table over there _,_ ” he says with a nod towards it. Fury huffs what for him might be a laugh, leaning back in his chair again and looking around the room with him, letting Steve’s discomfort go.

“Yeah, things’ve gotten both bigger and smaller since your time,” Fury says, eye slanting back to Steve, “We’re taking you off the Dream Dive.”

“I know,” Steve replies, gripping his knees a little. Fury studies him for a moment.

“We’ve gotten quite a bit back, considering,” Fury says, sitting forward again, “More than we were expecting.”

Steve glances down at his right hand, gets a flash of a red face then furious, blue-gray eyes and looks up. 

“I can’t remember my ma’s face,” he says, and Fury opens his mouth, “Without a picture.” Fury closes it. Steve raises his right hand, flexing the fingers out before curling them again, unable to close them all the way, just like always. “I remember this. I remember Schmidt and Bucky being-” he cuts himself off, changes tracks, “I remember the pain of my life more than anything. There was some good, but a lot of it was just…” He doesn’t know how to finish, doesn’t think there’s a way to. 

He looks over at Fury and lowers his hand and Fury looks back, steady as anything.

“I won’t get your hopes up,” Fury says, “The chances of you remembering anything more are slim, at best. We can’t do anything more with the Dream Dive.” Which means they can, but there’s higher risks, “You might remember a little more until its full after effects wear off.”

It doesn’t sound like enough, and Steve wants to use the Dream Dive again, but Fury’s already laid his cards out enough on that one for Steve to tell that he won’t agree to Steve doing it any further. 

“Agent Carter’s going to be showing you some apartments today,” Fury continues, pushing himself up and drawing their meeting to a close, “Pick the one you prefer. We’ll discuss anything further after you’ve had some more time to adjust.” He presses a button on his desk to page Carter and Steve stands up.

“Sir,” he says. Fury turns his head to look at him. “My things-”

“They’ll be delivered to the apartment you choose,” Fury says before he can finish. Steve nods, picks up the sound of familiar, approaching shoes and turns for the door.

“You’ll want me going on missions, won’t you,” Steve says. Twenty seconds left. He stops and turns around to look at Fury again, who looks back.

“I’d prefer it,” is all he says. 

Steve nods and turns back for the door just as Agent Carter opens it, looking surprised for all of three seconds before she recovers.

Steve kind of misses when people were more honest with their faces.

\--

He settles on a nice place in DC. 

Well.

 _All_ of the places Agent Carter took him to were nice compared to what he was used to (what he _remembered_ ). They were all practically the _ritz_ , just missing the gold and lights.

But he picked _this_ one because of the smell.

There’s lots of green outside, trees surrounding the place. They asked if he wanted somewhere out by a forest at first, but Steve remembers-

No. 

In the long run, it’s safer to live in the city. There’s more places to get lost in and hide, and if he needs to run, he can go to a forest then.

“I’ll be staying in the apartment next to yours,” Agent Carter says, and he pauses, turning to look at her. She shrugs a little. “Protection detail.”

“I don’t need protection,” Steve says automatically. She glances down at his right hand and his fingers curl a little, material of the glove stretching over gnarled fingers. He turns back around and heads for the boxes he sees stacked against the far wall, opening the first one.

“I’ll leave you to it,” she says. He hears her steps retreat, something metal set on wood (the key) and then the door closing with a _click_. He ignores the sound of another door opening just beyond it and focuses instead on the box.

The first thing he finds in it is a photograph, and he pulls it out with gentle, trembling fingers.

Bucky and eighteen year old _him_ stare up at him, Bucky’s arm looped around his shoulders with a grin and Steve smiling, a hundred and twenty-five pounds lighter than he is now.

Steve stares at it for a long time before gently setting the photo aside and pulling out the next item from a past that’s still in bits and pieces, scraped half raw and all of him still hurting.

\--

_“Come on, Steve, try it.”_

_Steve takes the cigarette, can smell it from a mile off but sniffs at the end of it before yanking his head back, holding the rolled cigarette away. “Smells like shit, Buck.”_

_Bucky barks out a laugh, the guys joining in._

_“You don’t smoke it for the smell, Rogers,” Jim replies, grinning._

_Steve rolls his eyes, bringing it to his lips and breathing in._

_“Slow, **Slow-!** ” Bucky says, quick. _

_But it’s not quick enough and Steve splutters, coughing and hacking._

_“ **Gimme that here** ,” Bucky says, “ **Christ**. Finally got you over your breathin’ problems at twelve, don’t need’em comin’ **back**.” _

_Steve hands the cigarette over in his direction, eyes watering, and feels it leave his fingers through the gloves while he waves his other hand in front of his face to try and clear the smell and smoke. He looks over and just catches the end of Bucky taking a breath of it in, eyes closed and head tilted back. Steve forces himself to look away before Bucky opens his eyes. Bucky lets out a sigh and Steve looks back over._

_The smoke curls up into the air, drifts like a fog but swirls like food coloring in water, twists up into the cloudy sky, and Steve’s fingers twitch, wants to draw it. Bucky cracks an eye open and looks over at him, lips pulling up into a smirk._

_“Yeah, **yeah** ,” Steve says, holding out his hand and making grabbing motions with it, “ **Give it back**. I’m gonna try again.”_

_“Sure you can handle it, Cap?” Monty teases. Steve gives him a look and snags the cigarette back when Bucky holds it out, bringing it in close._

_“ **Slow, Steve** ,” Bucky cautions. Steve flips him off with his free hand and breathes in to the sound of Bucky and the guys’ laughter, making himself go **slow** -_

 

He opens his eyes, stares up at the ceiling, tracks headlights slanting across it before they disappear and his vision goes dark again. He lays there for a minute, then sits up and pushes himself up off the bed, heading out of his new room and for the front door, snagging the key Agent Carter left on the narrow table by it as he goes.

Steve buys a pack of cigarettes and a lighter at the little store down the street, hands covered in gloves, and lights one outside the front of the shop, bringing it to his lips and breathing in. He coughs and splutters, holding it a little away from his face and blinking a few times to get rid of the sting, looking at it.

“Don’t even _taste_ the same,” he mutters to himself, glancing up at the two women who pass by, giggling at him before turning their heads towards each other and whispering.

He tunes them out, doesn’t want to hear how ‘adorable’ that was and if they should come back and ask for his number. He sets the cigarette between his lips and starts heading back to his apartment, taking the next drag in slow.

 _Twelve, huh,_ he thinks, burying his hands deeper into his jacket pockets and letting the smell of the smoke in front of his face briefly drown out the overwhelming smell of the city, letting his head drop a little while he hunches his shoulders in a bit.

He remembers a fair amount of his long life now, but he can’t remember being twelve.


	3. Told my love to wreck it all

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI GUYS. I'm so sorry this took so long to update. I didn't forget about it, I just got blind sided by this very _very persistent_ mermaid au that wanted to get done _now_ so _everything_ kind of got put on hold. But I did have a good portion of this chapter already written and I've already gotten through like four pages of the next and know where that's going, so this isn't dropped. I hate dropping things. I don't want to do it.  >8( So yes! I'm sorry for the delay. Everything that I'm working on will get updated probably within the next week or less including this one (again. Because next chapter is coming along and I'm really excited to write a particular scene).  
> Thank you for being so patient.
> 
> p.s. Stringlish (Kay), bless her, beta'd this for me since Gina (aprofessorstale) is so busy. <3

The punching bag goes flying, sand spraying out like blood out of a body shot down. The shoes that paused at the edge of the room three minutes ago finally step forward, soft to his ears and silent to anyone else’s, if there were anyone else in the gym.

“You here with a mission, Sir?” he asks.

“I am,” Fury replies, coming to a stop.

“Trying to get me back in the world?” Steve asks next, because they have been, subtly and through Carter. 

He unwraps his hand. 

He doesn’t _want_ to get back into the world.

“Trying to save it,” Fury replies.

That makes Steve look up.

\--

“An army,” Steve states at one point, “From _outer space_.”

“They’re called the Chitauri,” Thor says, and all Steve can think is: _Aliens are **real** , Buck. I wish you could be here to-_

Stark won’t stop staring at him when he gets the chance. 

He thinks he’s being subtle, but Steve _knows_.

\--

He fights. 

It’s different and the same all at once, but it’s easy to fall into step with other soldi- people who are used to fighting, who have done it for so long that it’s a part of them, just like it is for him.

The scents are almost overwhelming and the explosions have different sounds, but it’s all the same.

The only differences are small, but he still smells blood and bodies and gunfire and it’s like coming home to a place that he does and doesn’t want to be.

\--

Fury called them ‘The Avengers’, a group of ‘extraordinary people’.

The Avengers are flashy, dangerous, broken individuals coming together for the greater good, and Steve wonders if he’s found a place to fit in in this world that’s new to him while a darker part has him continuously scanning for threats.

For hunters. 

They’ll come. They always do.

\--

“Have you guys had shawarma?” Tony Stark asks when it’s all over, “I don’t know what it is, but I wanna try it.”

Tony Stark ends up staring at him almost the whole time, a light line between his brows like he’s trying to figure something out.

Like he’s trying to figure _Steve_ out.

Steve keeps his eyes on his food and lets himself feel _exhaustion_ , from feeling like a puzzle, something to be solved, from _fighting_ -

He sighs heavily.

From longing.

They talk here and there and eventually _Steve_ comes up as the topic.

They think what he has is a ‘serum’.

Steve doesn’t try and correct them, just makes his... _peace_ with Stark after they all eat and heads out.

Maybe seeing the world as it is now will help, and if he stops at the Grand Canyon with a sketchbook and draws a familiar face he’s known for most of his life, no one has to know that he’s still ‘stuck in the past’.

\--

Fury calls him a week later about missions, and when Steve gets back from Europe, Agent Carter takes him into S.H.I.E.L.D., though not without saying something about ‘werewolves in London’. 

Steve tenses, worried that it seems to be common knowledge until he realizes she’s talking about a movie.

“Give it a try,” she says with a teasing smile thrown his way, “I think you might like it.”

She leads him back up to Fury’s office and this time, Steve’s wearing gloves.

“You wanted to talk about missions, Sir?” Steve asks after they walk in.

“I do,” Fury replies. Steve comes to a stop with Sharon in front of his desk. “Before we do that though, we need to run some tests.” 

Steve tenses.

“Tests?” he asks, warily.

“Nothing like you’re thinking,” Fury replies, rounding his desk and walking over, “Endurance, stamina, the limits of your senses,” he lists off, walking past Steve and for the door. Steve starts to relax again. “ _Because_ there was no actual serum given to you and they decided to bench you for a year, no proper tests were ever done,” Fury continues, “We also might need to test your transformation process.” Steve re-tenses and Fury opens the door, holding it open. “Unless you can control it,” he adds, studying Steve, and Steve moves, walks out into the hall with Sharon close behind.

“I can control it fine,” Steve answers, “I just need to run sometimes.” 

Fury nods and leads the way down the hall, and Steve and Sharon follow him into the elevator.

“Alright then,” he replies easily, but Steve doesn’t think it’s going to be that easy.

\--

Turns out, it _is_. 

For the most part.

They test how far away he can smell and hear the three basics: Gas, liquid, solid. He gets some raised eyebrows at the distances for each and then more when he runs and jumps (which makes him feel like a trained _dog_ ). They test how well he can taste things, from bold to faint and back again, his touch sensitivity, and (he tries hard not to roll his eyes) how he interacts with _other_ _animals_.

The cats are wary, but mostly they just leave him alone.

The birds are twitchy, but they mostly leave him alone, too.

The dogs…

“ _Lazarus, come_ ,” the trainer orders. The dog inches a little closer to Steve’s heels on its belly, fluffy white and black tail curled around the front of his feet and wagging a little. “ _ **Lazarus**_.”

Steve slowly lifts a foot and gently nudges its hind leg, and it picks itself up off the floor and trots over to its trainer, tail mostly down and ears flopping a little, subdued.

He glances over and catches Agent Carter smiling, the most honest one he’s seen so far, and their eyes meet. 

Her smile doesn’t disappear when they do, and he twitches his lips up in return.

They test his approach to various situations next and his levels of stealth. 

Fury schedules him for training.

\--

“Again,” he orders, panting a little. Agent Carter hits the button and he takes off again down the maze, keeping his steps light and his breath near silent, slowing and creeping along the wall, pressing his back to it and stopping, edging just enough to peek around the corner.

There’s two ‘guards’ straight ahead, walking down the length of the hall. Steve watches for a long moment, focusing his senses before creeping around the corner and down the length of it after them.

He sticks a few feet back, crouching low, turning left down the next ‘hall’ when they turn right, keeping an eye on them and his ears open as he approaches another divide, moving right just before they round the corner and are capable of getting a glimpse of him.

After four tries, Steve finally clears the course without being detected in under five minutes.

\--

“I’m amazed you got it so quickly,” Sharon says as they head down to the parking garage, “It took me eight times just to get the whole maze memorized, and I’ve got the third highest score.

“Who’s at the top?” Steve asks, hands in his jacket. They step off of the elevator together.

“Agent Romanoff,” Sharon replies, lips quirking up mysteriously, “You beat her score. Expect a visit.”

“She doesn’t like losing?” Steve asks with a small smirk, stopping at his motorcycle and throwing a leg over the seat.

“Just...expect the unexpected,” Sharon replies cryptically with a teasing smile of her own, unlocking her car and slipping inside.

Steve nods back before turning his bike on and pulling out, pointing it towards the garage opening and heading out into the night.

It’ll be a full moon soon. Steve can feel it in his bones.

\--

Fury calls him in a day later.

“Tony Stark was almost killed yesterday evening,” he opens with as Steve’s heading for his desk. Steve quirks an eyebrow.

“That’s nothing unusual,” he replies, coming to a stop in front of Fury’s desk. Fury huffs a breath.

“Pull up footage,” he orders, nodding towards the large screen opposite them. Steve turns to look at it.

It shows Tony talking with a stockier man with slicked back brown hair in a black suit, both of them ducking and the suited man quickly ushering Tony inside when Tony quickly turns his head the other direction and a bullet grazes his ear, missing its target. It looks like the bullet missed completely by accident.

“Any word on the shooter?” Steve asks, turning back to Fury.

Fury looks at him for a long moment, and Steve can sense...something, but he’s not sure what.

“What I’m about to tell you cannot leave this room,” Fury says, and Steve nods, expression solemn.

Fury nods back and then says, “Secure room.” All of the windows darken and Steve hears the door lock and vents seal.

“The shot was taken from two point five miles away,” Fury says, and Steve’s eyebrows climb, eyes widening a little, because-

“That’s-” he starts, and Fury nods.

“The current, longest world record is _roughly_ a mile short of that,” he says, leaning forward in his chair, fingers steepled, “Pull up all files on the Winter Soldier,” he instructs. Steve turns to look at the screen again.

There’s not much to see, picture-wise: a grainy picture here, a blurry one there, _all_ from a great distance. The information seems to be sparse on him, too, but from what there is to see, it’s...impressive. 

_Scarily_ impressive.

Steve takes a step closer to the screen, reading over the information quickly.

“This is…” he trails off, hears Fury stand and round his desk.

“He’s a ghost,” Fury says, “To most people. Even agencies like as ours aren’t fully convinced he exists. But I’m not most people.” Steve glances over at him.

“You think this is who tried to kill Stark,” he surmises. Fury just looks back. “Sir,” Steve starts, “Why did you call me here.”

“I want you to catch him,” Fury replies, crossing his arms behind his back, “By guarding Stark.”

Steve’s brows draw together. “You want me to use Stark as bait.”

Fury inclines his head a little. “It’s the only way,” he says, “The Winter Soldier is only ever visible from _any_ distance when he’s on the hunt. No one’s been able to track him and my best agents have _tried_.” 

Steve looks back at him for a long moment before looking to the screen again. 

“You want me to track him, catch him, and then what?” he asks, looking back over at Fury, “What are you going to do with him?”

“Find out what he knows, who he works for, what exactly he’s been involved in,” Fury answers. Steve senses that’s not all of it, though.

“Get him to work for you?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. Fury huffs another breath, smaller, darker.

“Only one way to find out,” he replies. Steve sighs.

“Stark’s not going to like this,” he says, already feeling a headache coming on. _Steve’s_ not going to like this.

“He’ll go along with it,” Fury replies, turning to head back around and sit at his desk.

Somehow, Steve gets the feeling it’s not going to be that easy.

\--

“ _I can protect myself_ ,” Tony says, raising an eyebrow, “ _Obviously_.”

“That was _before_ you blew up all your suits,” Fury counters, fingers laced on top of his desk. 

Steve watches the exchange from the couch.

Tony huffs. “ _You think that was all of them?_ ”

“I _know_ that was all of them,” Fury replies, “Because the woman you blew them up for means too much to you for it not to have been.”

Tony’s expression sobers and his mouth tightens just a bit, just enough for Steve and Fury’s trained eyes to tell.

“ _She **also** means too much for me to leave either of us vulnerable_ ,” Tony returns.

Fury’s quiet for a moment, staring him down.

Tony sighs.

“ _But you’re right. I did blow them all up_ ,” he concedes, “ _I’m currently working on the latest model_ ,” he adds with a smirk. Steve glances at Fury and it looks like the only thing keeping him from rolling his eye is years of _practice_.

“Captain Rogers will be assigned as your protection detail,” Fury says after a moment. _Tony_ rolls his eyes.

“ _I don’t know what was in that serum, but he doesn’t have any senses that my **own** sensors can’t pick up,_ ” Tony replies, frowning.

“And if the power goes out?” Fury asks, slightly patronizing if Steve’s hearing right. Tony frowns deeper.

“ _You want this ‘ghost’ that badly?_ ” Tony asks, “ _I want in._ ” 

Fury’s expression drops.

“Why?” he asks.

“ _Because I can tell you **really** want him, which makes **me** want to know why_ ,” Tony replies, smirking again. Fury stares at him long and hard and then finally concedes with a breath when Tony doesn’t budge.

“Five percent,” Fury offers.

“ _Twelve_ ,” Tony replies smugly.

Fury _almost_ rolls his eye that time. Almost. Steve can tell.

“ _Fine_ ,” he agrees, and Tony nods, glancing down at Steve.

“ _See you soon, big boy_ ,” he says with a salacious wink. Steve raises an unimpressed eyebrow at him and then the call disconnects.

“Well,” Steve says after a moment, looking back to Fury, “ _This_ is going to be interesting.”

Fury just sighs, rubbing a finger between closed eyes like he’s getting a headache, too.

\--

The Tower’s still in the middle of repairs when Steve gets there, but it’s essentially an empty building that still works, which means no one else will be put in harm’s way and they’ll still have use of all of the facilities, as well as Tony’s...personal computer, which he seems to rely on.

 _Heavily_.

“JARVIS, this is Steve Rogers,” Tony introduces with a carefree wave of his arm in his general direction, “Steve Rogers, meet JARVIS.”

“ _A pleasure to meet you, Sir_ ,” comes a voice from... _everywhere_. 

Steve jolts a little, doing a full spin.

“Uh, yeah,” he replies a little stiltedly, not sure where to look and if he should greet it at all, “You too.” 

Tony snorts, but doesn’t say anything, just steps into the elevator. Steve follows.

It’s silent for a few moments, but Steve can smell that Stark’s...anxious.

“So I’m remodeling the Tower,” Tony cuts into the silence. Steve nods his head a little, glancing over at him. “Was thinking about making a floor for each of the Avengers,” he adds too casually. 

Steve turns his head slowly to actually look at him.

“Are you asking me to move in, Stark?” he asks, half joking.

Stark shrugs, still too casual, and then the doors are sliding open and he’s stepping out, Steve following again.

“It’s not a _ring_ , Rogers,” Tony says, keeping away from the windows, Steve notices, and walking behind things, like every piece of furniture, “I don’t want your babies or anything.” Steve’s eyebrows jump up a little while Tony glances back over at him and then rolls his eyes. “Just think about it,” he finishes, and Steve shakes his head a little, lips not sure whether to smile, smirk, or grimace, and he doesn’t think he can do all three.

\--

They spend the next six hours in Tony’s workshop on the eightieth ( _eightieth, **hell**_ ) floor, Steve finding ways to occupy himself while Tony works on...whatever he seems to be working on now. He keeps darting between four different things and Steve had given up trying to sort through it after the first ten times Tony switched projects around. 

From what Steve can tell, one’s a new suit, like Tony had said earlier, one looks like another reactor, another something small and tiny that Steve can’t understand without an explanation clearer than the ramble Tony ended up getting into before it trailed off into a distracted mutter, and something else Steve’s also given up trying to put a word to, but it looks a little like a metallic snake with a rectangle for a head. 

Steve’s kept himself busy by distinguishing scents in the workshop, keeping a look out, and listening to the various sounds Tony makes: his heart beats, the reactor in his chest (the most interesting sound Steve’s heard in a _long_ time, can’t think of anything else like it), his breaths, the little sounds and grumbles he makes when he either likes or doesn’t like where his work is going, the little taps and beats and humming, the sounds of his tools and the stool sliding across the floor, squeaking when Tony turns the seat to three-fourths. 

Tony had wanted to listen to music, but Steve had vetoed that since he wouldn’t be able to hear as well, and as distracting as Tony is, Steve _is_ keeping half of his focus on monitoring the few windows that have anything close to a clear line of sight to Tony, and trying to ignore the itch under his skin that’s been growing over the past couple days. There’s a full moon in a day or two. He hopes they can wrap this up before then.

He’s also been expecting an interrogation from Tony about his ‘serum’ since Tony still glances at him every so often while he works, but Tony seems to want to try and figure it out on his own as much as he can, first.

“You want pizza? I want pizza,” Tony says suddenly, first thing he’s said to Steve in a while, “I think we should order pizza.” Steve scans the buildings outside the windows while he half listens, New York City lit up brighter than it’s ever been at night- _had_ been at night.

His instincts-

“I think you should get away from the windows,” Steve says slowly, eyes just as slowly locking on something roughly a mile off, a high rise building barely visible through the jigsaw of skyscrapers. He can feel Tony’s eyes on him. “ _Now_ ,” Steve orders, gets up and dart over in a burst of speed to block the shot that was aimed for Tony’s head with his shield just as Tony’s starting to stand up, glass shattering in a burst and littering the floor.

Steve keeps the shield up while curving around Tony, covering him with his body while they run for the stairwell and quickly take it up to the next floor while two other shots ring out, one skimming Steve’s pant leg and just missing his _leg_ leg while another bounces off of his shield and hits the wall above their heads.

“ _JARVIS_ ,” Tony orders as they step out onto the floor, “ _Lockdown Tower_.”

“ _Yes, Si_ -”

The power cuts out.

That was _fast_.

They stand there for a moment, Steve listening intently.

“There must be more than one of them,” Tony says, “Fury’s never going to let me live this down,” he adds in a grumble, but Steve can smell the growing fear on him. It’s manageable, at least, but this makes things...more difficult. 

He’d reviewed the Winter Soldier’s files as much as he could before coming, but it didn’t tell him much in terms of _style_. The guy’s never had to come this close, not that S.H.I.E.L.D.’s been able to record. Most of his missions have been long range assassinations, and the ones that _were_ up close and personal had little to no trace of evidence left behind to give investigators much of an idea of what happened other than ‘ _the_ _Winter Soldier got in and killed them_ ’. That makes having any idea other than ‘he’s coming up to finish the job’ difficult.

And as far as Tony’s assumption, Steve doesn’t think there’s anyone else working with the Winter Soldier, either.


	4. And the wolves howl their songs

“We need to go higher,” Tony says. Steve’s eyes snap to him as he frowns.

“No, we need to go _lower_ ,” he counters, “You want us to strand ourselves?”

“The nearest Tower lockdown failsafe is three stories up,” Tony replies, “We can-”

“Lock him inside the building,” Steve finishes for him, glancing up towards the ceiling while he calculates quickly.

“You mean them,” Tony says, pulling Steve halfway out of his thoughts.

“No,” he replies, glancing around the room before heading for the elevator and pressing an ear to the door, “I mean _him_.”

“But that’s-” Tony starts, but Steve throws a hand up and Tony, thankfully, goes quiet. 

Steve listens, focuses his hearing and closes his eyes and _listens_.

Nothing. Just silence. 

He pulls back and then extends his nails, the right hand’s going through the gloves, and wedges them between the elevator door and the wall, getting them in enough to _pull_ , making sure to be careful and keep it quiet. 

Fortunately, Stark seems to like his things nice and clean once they’re finished, so the door doesn’t squeak.

Steve retracts his nails once he’s got the door open enough and glances up and then down the elevator shaft, making sure it’s clear. He turns back to Tony and holds out his hand.

Tony raises an eyebrow.

“What, no ‘ _come with me if you want to live_ ’?” he asks. Steve frowns, brows drawing together a little and Tony rolls his eyes, stepping forward. “Someone really needs to update your pop culture references.”

Steve just lowers his eyebrows a little and slips his shield off, handing it to Tony once he’s close enough, who examines it for a moment before slipping it on his arm with a smirk and then hopping onto Steve’s back, with a little help.

“I hate this,” Tony says near his ear, and Steve snorts, makes sure Tony’s secure before leaping into the elevator shaft and grabbing hold of the wires in the middle, looking up as they slowly sway to still.

“You and me both,” he says, calculating again while he starts to climb.

There should only be two possible ways into the building as it is, but if the Winter Soldier _is_ like him, then-

Steve freezes, ears picking up something that sounds like scraping. 

Stark freezes too.

“What is it?” he whispers after a moment, and Steve starts climbing again.

“He’s coming up the side of the building,” Steve answers. There’s a pointed silence. “How many floors above us are the repairs being done?”

“Five,” Stark answers. Steve pauses.

Two floors separating them from a literal hole in the wall to the outside.

Just two.

Not good.

“Right,” Steve says, before looking back over his shoulder, “I need you to _really_ hang on.” Stark’s brows draw together but he tightens his hold. “You can ask me about what I’m about to do later,” Steve adds, then looks back again briefly, “I take that back. Don’t ask me at all.” Stark starts to open his mouth and Steve looks up and climbs, gets his foot on the next floor ledge just as Stark starts talking and _launches_ off, clearing the remaining two floors in one jump, Stark’s fingers tightening on the front of his uniform. Steve extends his nails again, transforms his hands just a little and catches the ledge of the second floor, pulling them both up and then wedging his nails between the door and wall, slowly, quietly pulling it open. Stark’s heart is pounding through his back, can feel it even under his suit, but Steve’s pretty sure it’s not from fear. 

Smells more _excited_ than _afraid_.

“ _Don’t_ ,” Steve whispers when he hears Stark pull in a breath, scans the dark room, “ _Ask me about it. Just go lock down the building_.” Stark slips off of his back before his steps retreat after he hands back the shield and Steve keeps an eye on the room, eyes open and ears listening. There’s still the faint sound of scraping, silent to anyone else at this distance but soft to his ears, louder than it was three floors ago. It’s getting higher, not too much higher than _they_ currently are.

The scraping stops.

Steve hears something _click_ and then... _light_ is rippling down the side of the building, like a soft, brief shimmer over water and then it’s gone. Steve looks over at Stark.

“That it?” he asks. Tony scoffs.

“‘ _That it_ ’, he asks,” Tony says, giving him a look, “Yeah, that’s it. Just a newly developed, nigh impenetrable energy shield. No big deal.”

“And if it cuts out?” Steve asks, ignoring the jab, and looks back to the open elevator door.

“Then reinforced glass, two inches thick and specially designed comes down to seal the Tower,” Stark replies, “ _Almost_ as impenetrable.”

Steve nods slightly. “We need to move.”

“Where?” Stark asks. Steve looks over at him and Stark snorts. “Fury wants to use me as bait.” Steve sighs and Tony nods, crossing his arms. “No, it’s a good plan. So where do you wanna do this?”

Steve gives him a slightly helpless look then tries to think, sees a cord shift slightly in the elevator shaft.

“ _Not here_ ,” he whispers, taking hold of Tony’s arm and running for the stairwell.

\--

It swings out onto the floor and lands silent, eyes darting left then right, sweeping the whole room. It keeps its steps silent as it moves, catches faint scents (one... _different_ ) on the air and looks to the left.

It runs, tracks the scents past the stairwell door.

\--

Tony waits. 

And he’s not quite sure how he knows, maybe it’s from being in a few battles and life or death situations, maybe he can tell when the air shifts a little better. Maybe it’s because he’s the son of Howard Stark and grew up knowing when he’s being watched.

But he knows he’s being watched.

He keeps his eyes on the hall, watching the red flood lights light up the black of it every two seconds.

“ _Heeere assassin, assassin, assassin_ ,” he calls, throwing in a whistle for good measure. He sees something black shift slightly and then the shape of a man step out at the end of the hall. “Thaat’s right,” he mutters to himself, smirking, “Come and get me.” The figure doesn’t move for a minute, stays completely still, and the next time the hall lights up bright red the figure’s closer, taking a step-

The hall goes black.

It’s closer.

_Black._

Closer.

_Black._

Something shifts. 

Tony frowns.

_Black._

It looks like the figure... _ripples_.

Tony narrows his eyes.

_Black-_

The fingers look a little long.

 _Black_ -

The figure’s hunching-

 _Black_ -

The sound of something _tearing_.

 _Spikes_ -

 _Black_ -

Tony’s eyes widen.

 _Black_ -

The figure’s shorter, narrower, shaped like-

 _Black_ -

He hears multiple _clacking_ on the floor-

_Black-_

The figure stops. 

Red glints off silver.

_Black._

Tony snaps his fingers.

It’s gone.

_Black._

Tony snaps his fingers quickly, catching something out of the corner of his eye. He whips around-

Something _whirs_ past him and _**clangs**_ against the side of a giant, metal _paw_ aimed right for his _face_ -

“ _Move!_ ” he hears, spins and _runs_ -

Steve darts past him, catches his shield and Tony spins back around once he’s near the stairwell door. 

Steve blocks another swipe, paw colliding into the shield with a heavy, metallic _thud_. There’s _another_ and then the- _wolf_ spins and hits it with a back leg, sending Steve skidding a few feet. Another, _harder_ , and Steve’s sent flying, skidding to a stop on his back a few feet away from Tony and quickly pushing himself back up.

He raises his shield, stance defensive, and glances from the giant black wolf to Tony.

“Tony,” he says, and Tony stares at the wolf for a moment longer. It’s not moving, just crouched low on its front paws. He looks over at Steve.

“Yeah?” he asks, voice rough. He clears it.

Steve studies him for a moment before looking back straight ahead. 

“I’m about to do something that might scare you,” he says, keeping his eyes on the wolf, “Do me a favor and don’t scream. You’ll just draw his attention.” Steve slowly lowers his shield to the ground, eyes on the wolf the whole time, and reaches for his uniform straps. 

Tony frowns. “What are you doing?” he asks. Steve strips out of the tops, motions still slow, then his pants, and then Tony’s seeing _miles_ of night bathed skin and not a tattoo or scar in sight. 

He manages not to whistle.

“Just don’t make a sound,” Steve warns, and then he-

He _runs_ at the wolf-

The wolf crouches lower and then launches itself too, and Rogers-

 _Elongates_. 

_Shifts_.

Two large wolves clash, black and dark blonde and black, the blonde’s teeth bared and burying in dark fur while a metal paw swipes at its hind leg. The blonde one lets go and goes for the muzzle strapped on the black one, catches a strap and spins quick, sending the black wolf into some furniture by the wall with a heavy _crashthud **thunk** , _strap _snap_ ping. 

The black wolf rises out of the pile of wood and metal parts with a quick shake of its head, muzzle gone, and the blonde one _freezes_. 

It makes a small sound, something like a cross between _inquisitive_ and a _whimper_. 

The black one stops and stares.

Neither move or make another sound. The blonde one raises its head after a moment, tail shifting slightly behind it. 

The black one growls, low and quiet, and the blonde’s tail drops, ears flicking down.

The black one rushes the blonde and the blonde one rolls with it, lets out a high pitched _yelp_ when teeth sink into its back leg and then lashes up, getting the black one with a heavy paw to the stomach and then following it with headbutt, ramming into it hard enough to send it flying a few feet and then darting up and running after it, hitting it again _harder_ and sending it straight into the wall. The black one drops with a heavy _thud_.

It doesn’t get back up.

The blonde one watches it, panting, red streaking blonde fur. It’s ears swivel a few times and then its tail and ears lower while it slowly pads over, fur shortening and bones shifting with nauseating _crack_ s the closer it gets until _Steve’s_ crawling the last foot closer and kneeling, reaching for the black-

For the _man_.

Tony slowly moves closer.

Steve reaches out a hand, pauses, and then slowly touches his fingers to the man’s cheek, pushing his bangs back. Tony frowns and then his eyes widen when he sees the face. He knows his history.

“Steve,” he says slowly, “ _What the fuck is going on?_ ”

Steve stares down at _James Buchanan fucking Barnes_ for a long while, red streaking skin and slowly pooling to the floor, red still flashing back in the hall, brighter than the blood.

Steve looks up at him.

Tony stares back.

“It’s Bucky,” Steve says.

Tony stares at him for a moment, pieces clicking into place- “ _Oooh no_ ,” he says, “We are _not_ keeping him here. We need to hand him over to _Fury_.”

Steve _growls_ , double toned with something _deeper_ than a human’s range, irises... _expanding_ a little while his teeth elongate, _sharpen_. 

_Huh,_ Tony thinks distantly _, That’s cool_.

“I am _not_ handing him over to Fury,” Steve replies vehemently.

Tony just stares.

“Steve,” he starts, and Steve practically _bristles_ in all his naked glory, “He just tried to kill us. _Both_ of us.” Steve backs off a little.

“The Bucky I know wouldn’t do that,” he replies, sounding a little...unsure.

“Stating the obvious,” Tony starts, “But he might not be the Bucky you _knew_.” Steve drops his eyes to said _Bucky_ and stares for a long minute before shaking his head slowly, looking back up. “What do you want _me_ to do?” Tony asks, “Stick him in the Tower _basement?_ ”

\--

“I can’t believe we stuck him in the basement,” Tony says half an hour later, staring at a holoscreen with a view into the room. 

He turns to Steve, tossing him another small roll of gauze when the first doesn’t cut it. 

“So,” he says, “Now what?”

“Now, we figure out what’s going on,” Steve answers, sitting on a counter back against the wall and wrapping gauze around the bite in his thigh. Tony watches him for a moment.

“Speaking of figuring out what’s going on…” he trails off, and Steve sighs quietly, glancing up at Tony briefly before focusing back on the gauze.

“I still don’t want you to ask,” he replies, and Tony _scoffs_.

“I acted as bait,” he says, ticking the points off on his fingers, “Didn’t make any noise, gave you _free range_ of my medical supplies, _and_ I’m housing your wolf boyfriend. You could at _least_ tell me _something_ ,” he gripes, “ _Captain Werewolf_.” Steve glances up again and then finishes wrapping the gauze, standing back up and fixing the bottom of his boxers down around it. Tony hums thoughtfully in the silence. “So you _are_ a werewolf then. Interesting.” Steve rolls his eyes a little and walks over to the screen. Tony turns to look with him.

Barnes is starting to wake, fingers twitching a little and head shifting slightly.

“I’m going in,” Steve says, and Tony catches his arm quick as he turns. Steve stops and turns to look back at him.

“At _least_ wait until he _wakes up_ ,” Tony says exasperatedly, “Rushing into situations might have worked _somewhat_ in the past, but don’t you think we should play this one carefully? You don’t know _what’s_ been done to him, or how he’ll react _this_ time. As far as we know, _I’m_ still his mission and _you’re_ the one who stopped him from getting that done. I don’t think he’s gonna be happy too see you.” 

Steve frowns, a muscle ticking in his jaw, but he doesn’t pull away, so Tony releases his arm.

Steve sighs heavily. “Fine,” he concedes, eyes drawn back up to the screen.

Tony nods and looks up too.

Barnes pushes himself up on his hands and knees and lifts his head, hair shadowing half his face and eyes quickly searching the room. When he finds nothing, he stands, still as a statue, and waits.


	5. And every time I look into your eyes, you make me wanna die

“Hello there, Mr. Murder-wolf,” Tony opens with, watches Barnes’ eyes slant to and fro to try and pinpoint the sound, “My name’s Tony, what’s yours?”

Barnes’ eyes land on one of the cameras, though it’s tiny enough Tony’s not sure if he can actually _see_ it.

He’s not sure how well werewolves do _anything_.

Silence.

Tony flips the microphone off for a moment.

“Right…” he trails off, glancing over at Steve, who’s got his arms crossed but is at _least_ wearing _pants_ now. Tony flicks the microphone back on. “Just out of curiosity, are you still trying to kill me?”

 _That_ gets a response.

“ _You’re my mission_ ,” Barnes states, flat and hollow, and Steve’s arms uncross in Tony’s periphery. He glances over and sees Steve’s fingers curl into tight fists, looking like he’s _straining_ to keep himself quiet.

“Mind telling me who wants me dead?” Tony ask next, shifting his eyes back to Barnes.

Silence.

Tony decides to throw caution to the wind.

“So...what can you tell me about werewolves?” 

Nothing. 

_Okay then_ , he thinks.

“What can you tell me about Captain America?”

Barnes tenses, just fractionally, Tony needs Jarvis monitoring him to actually know he _does_ it.

“What can you tell me about Steve Rogers?” Tony tries next.

Barnes’ expression goes a little more steely, a little more _hollow_ , if _that’s_ even possible. Apparently, it is.

Steve tenses further from his left, which means Tony’s running out of time with the microphone.

 _Fine_.

“What can you tell me about James Buchanan Barnes?”

Barnes goes loose in a way that doesn’t make Tony relaxed at _all_.

Steve finally snaps and comes over-

“ _Bucky_ -”

Barnes re-tenses all over again, triple time, hands becoming fists and eyes zeroing in on another camera.

He seems to go loose and hollow again a few seconds after.

“Do you remember me?” Steve asks, expression torn, “It’s me...It’s Steve.”

Nothing.

Steve’s fists curl tighter and Tony raises his hand a little to- What? Offer comfort? - Before redirecting it to the panel in front of him.

“We’re going to keep you in here for a while,” Tony says after a moment, eyes on Barnes _and_ Rogers, “There’s a full moon coming up. Hope you’re comfy,” and flicks off the microphone, taking another moment before turning his head to look at Steve, giving him that little bit of time.

Steve’s still a mess, but he’s a little more composed when his eyes find Tony’s face.

Silence.

“You _do_ wolf out on a full moon, ri-”

“ _Stark_.”

\--

Steve stares out at the city, watches the lights sparkle like diamonds and squints his eyes just enough to turn them into stars. 

He sighs after half an hour and makes the call.

“ _Is it done?_ ”Fury opens with, not even a ‘hello’, not that Steve was expecting one.

“He got away,” Steve lies. 

People seem to think he’s terrible at it, but then again, he hasn’t really _needed_ to lie, not like this.

And besides, this is for Bucky.

He can lie.

Silence.

“I’ll be staying with Stark until it’s finished,” Steve says after a few moments, looking over at a bizarre...vase...thing and using the sense of _strange_ looking at it gives him to help keep his other emotions in check. There’s an abundance of ‘strange’ in the Tower, so it’s not too hard.

“ _Enhanced?_ ” Fury finally asks, and Steve’s heart beats faster. 

He forces it calm.

“Yes,” he answers truthfully, though he’s not going to say _how_ _much_.

“ _Report at 1800_ ,” Fury orders.

“Roger,” Steve replies, then hangs up after Fury does.

He blows out a slow breath after a moment and sets the phone next to the vase as he passes it, just in case the phone’s not as _secure_ as he was told (from the organization who _told_ _him_ ), and heads back down to the basement.

“ _Captain Rogers_ ,” JARVIS greets as soon as he steps into the room, and Steve doesn’t jolt this time. A holoscreen appears in front of the wall like an x-ray, showing Bucky beyond it. 

He’s crouched in a corner of the room at the far right, forearms resting on the top of his thighs and eyes closed.

Steve’s heart gives a _squeeze_.

He looks so...different. 

Steve still doesn’t remember everything, but he remembers _Bucky_ , enough to know and _feel_ that he’s...important. _Beyond_ important. He’s-...

Well. Steve’s not sure there’s much of _anything_ he wouldn’t do for Bucky, even without every single memory of him.

But _is_ this Bucky? What if it isn’t? What if it’s _not_ Bucky, somehow. What if it’s not Bucky _in_ there, _anywhere?_

What if Bucky’s gone?

Steve walks over to the panel and looks over the buttons, pressing the one labeled ‘mic’, nail _clacking_ against the surface, and looks up at the holoscreen, opening his mouth and-

He stops, closes it. 

What should he say?

He stares at Bucky’s hunched over form, his long hair, his closed eyes-

_What should he say?_

Bucky’s eyes crack open and slant to take in the room, settling on one of the cameras again. 

They open further and stare.

Oh. Right. Heightened hearing. 

Steve hasn’t been around anyone like him in long enough he keeps forgetting.

Steve clears his throat a little and Bucky’s eyes - _the Winter Soldier’s?_ \- open the rest of the way. 

Maybe Steve should treat this like _he_ was, when he was just woken up with no clue who he was. 

“Hi,” he settles on.

Silence. 

Bucky just stares, expression blank.

“My name’s Steve. What’s your name?”

Silence.

Steve keeps his breathing steady, heart rate down. Bucky- The Winter Soldier will know, otherwise.

“Do you know who you are?”

Silence.

“This conversation’s pretty one sided,” Steve says, trying for light and _mostly_ getting there, “I can do this all night.”

Silence.

Steve does _not_ sigh ( _he really doesn’t, that would be admitting something to a dangerous Bucky, still Bucky, but **dangerous** to Steve. Not that he doesn’t want to sigh, though. This is harder than talking to a **wall** , and he’s **done** that, albeit mentally_ ).

Steve takes a seat in the chair.

“I was born in 1902,” he starts, just like he did with S.H.I.E.L.D., “Two years before you, but you always looked older than me.”

Bucky continues staring.

Steve sits back in the chair a little.

“It was a while ago now,” he continues, makes sure to keep his voice from going soft and quiet, “We’re both over a century old now.” Steve smiles a little, small and sad, can’t help _that_ from getting into his voice. “It wasn’t too long ago for me, but it’s history...to everyone else.”

Silence.

Steve holds in another sigh, this time for a completely different reason.

“Do you ever feel so old,” he starts, lets his voice go quiet this time, “That you feel like you’re...rusting? But you know you’re not? That you won’t, not for a long, long time.” 

Something in Bucky’s eyes flickers, like a small ember starting to glow, just enough to see in the dark.

“I feel so old, Buck,” Steve confesses to the silence, to the sounds of their breathing that only they can hear, like the sounds of their steady hearts beating out a near endless stretch of time.

Like seventy years across decades. 

Steve lets his head fall back, staring up at the ceiling. 

“We’re still so young, and so old,” he continues, “I think our ma’s would be sad, to see us this way.”

He raises his right hand up, watches the skin stretch over mottled bone, curls his fingers and then straightens them back out.

He opens his mouth, to _ramble_ , to _fill the silence_ , _to_ -

“ _Stay out of my way_.”

Steve jerks a little and sits up sharply, staring at the holoscreen.

Bucky stares back, eyes- more _alive_.

Steve shakes his head.

“I can’t. I can’t do that, Buck.”

Silence.

“Stark may be annoying, but-”

“ _He will die_ ,” Bucky cuts him off, and Steve shakes his head again even though Bucky can’t see him, standing up from the chair.

“Bucky-”

“ _ **Who the hell is Bucky?**_ ” Bucky practically _snarls_ , jerking up sharply out of his crouch, fingers curled into fists.

Steve pauses.

“Someone who died,” he answers after a minute, finally letting his voice go soft, “A long time ago.” 

Bucky hesitates, just for the briefest part of a moment, but Steve’s eyes catch it.

“Someone who used to look out for me when I was being a dumb shit,” he continues, still soft, wants to smile but can’t bring himself to. 

His own fingers curl into fists, the right not all the way, just like it has been since- 

“Someone who I think followed me,” Steve says, quieter, throat going tight, “Whether he wanted to or not. Just like he always has.”

Bucky stares.

A dual holoscreen materializes in the room on _Bucky’s_ side and Bucky’s eyes widen fractionally when they finally _**see**_ _him_.

“ _I’m so sorry, Bucky_ ,” Steve finally manages to get out, the backs of his eyes stinging.

Bucky stares for another moment before _lashing_ out at the screen, sharp nails _scraping_ across the wall while he _yells_ , _eyes_ \- 

Almost _frantic_ -

The second screen dematerializes and the switch on the panel _flicks_. 

Steve drops into the chair.

“ _Captain_ ,” JARVIS says softly, “ _I took the liberty of turning off the microphone with the screen, but have left the holoscreen view into Sergeant Barnes’ room on_.” 

Steve bends forward and grits his teeth, breaths coming too fast.

“Thank you,” he manages to choke out, before he clenches his jaw and sniffs, hard, listening to Bucky’s breathing slow while his own picks up in the silence.


	6. Run

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI GUYS. I'M SORRY IT'S BEEN SO LONG. Things have been up and down, I don't have a job anymore (most of the reason things have been up and down. It went down hill and really flattened my creative/writing muse), and I'm trying to find a new one. I'M ALSO TRYING TO CATCH UP ON ALL MY STORIES. Thank you for being so patient, guys. You're amazing.
> 
> NOW. ON WITH THE SHOW. ALSO. I'm posting the next chapter after this almost immediately after I post this one so WATCH OUT FOR IT.

“So,” Tony starts, “Heard you showed _emotion_ yesterday.”

The Winter Soldier stares blankly at the wall.

“Don’t worry,” Tony continues, undeterred, “Cap’s usuallygot that affect on people. Probably the only thing we have in _common_.”

Silence.

“I _love_ silent conversational partners, they make it so much easier to talk more about _me_ -”

He ignores the shudder that zigzags down his spine at the double-toned _growl_ Barnes makes and rolls his eyes instead, even though Barnes can’t see him.

“I know,” Tony says, forcing his voice calm. Steve warned him about that. Werewolf hearing. “I’m a _delight_.”

Barnes is silent for the next five hours of _that_ one-sided conversation.

That’s perfectly alright. Tony can talk about himself for five hours. He can talk about himself for _ten._

\--

The rest of the night passes mostly the same. The Winter Soldier; Bucky, staring at walls while Tony rambles, and the same when Steve lets Bucky know he’s there. After reporting to Fury that he’s got a beat on the Soldier to keep him off his back, Steve talks sometimes even though Bucky hasn’t said a word since last night.

Nothing changes until-

\--

Tony glances up. 

“Jittery?” he asks.

Steve stops bouncing his leg, manages to sit still for a full minute before he’s pushing himself up out of the chair and pacing. 

He can feel Tony slant him a _look_.

“Full moon?” he asks next.

Steve slants one right _back_.

Tony raises his hands in mock-surrender.

“Think of it less as _asking_ and more as _confirming_ ,” he says. Steve rolls his eyes, turning sharply on his heel with a high-pitched, rubber _squeak_ to pace the other way.

“ _Sergeant Barnes appears to be exhibiting the same behavior_ ,” JARVIS comments.

A holoscreen appears and Steve looks at it while he continues to pace, watches Bucky do the same to the length of the room he’s still in, fingers curling and uncurling into fists rhythmically.

“We’ll need to run soon-” Steve starts.

“Don’t worry about it,” Tony cuts him off, “I’m working on something. Should be done by sunset.” 

Steve frowns but keeps pacing, can hear every _scrich-screech_ of his boots across the shiny floor, every _tick_ of metallic parts in every room, every _heartbeat inside the tower_ -

He stops with a frustrated _growl_ and pulls his boots and socks off quickly, tossing them to the side of the lab before going back to pacing, stretching his toes against the shiny, cool floor and letting his toenails lengthen a bit, just enough for them to _clack_ gently against the shine and drown out some of the metallic _ticking_. 

He glances at the hologram, keeping pace with Bucky. He can _feel_ Stark raising an eyebrow at him.

“Have you tried yoga?” Tony asks, “Bruce says yoga is good.”

Steve sighs before heading for the stairs.

“ _I’ll let you know when it’s ready!_ ” Tony calls after him before the door closes with a _thud **click**_.

\--

Three hours and a dozen floors of the Tower covered in footprint smudges later, and the sun is setting, winding down while Steve is winding _up_. 

It’s hard to focus.

“ _Cap_.” 

Steve stops and looks up.

“ _It’s done. Please proceed to the right side of the room_ ,” Tony adds, cheerful, like he’s reciting the lines from something.

Steve moves to the right and then that same _shimmer_ that had coated the outside of the tower rains down and drifts up from the ceiling and floor, meeting in the middle. This time, it stays, soft and barely there to the human eye but like a _glimmer_ to his. 

Steve looks behind himself and then forward.

It divides the room in what looks like perfectly in half, curves and continues around the corner down past the doorway up ahead like a yellow, traffic divider line.

“ _There’s your tracks_ ,” Tony says from the ceiling, and Steve looks up again, “ _They run throughout almost the entire Tower, except for where I’m at. Now, I’m releasing the hound!_ ”

Steve frowns but then stills, listening intently for-

There’s a _growl- **howl,**_ old and familiarand Steve _shudders,_ fingernails lengthening on their own. 

He pulls his clothes off quick, leaves them where they land and starts shifting, bones _snapping_ and fur growing. He’s just finished when he sees something dark and blurred dart around the corner at the end of the room in his periphery and turns to look, sees Bucky running in the second track.

Steve _takes_ _off_ and they both _run_ , glancing over to see Bucky glancing back. 

His heart thuds in his chest and Steve knows it’s not just from finally being able to run.

( _But that it’s from finally being able to run with **Bucky**_ ).

-

Pale yellow in his periphery. _Gold._

_Familiar._

The Winter Soldier turns a hall, gold moving with him on the other side of the divider like a-

_Mirror._

**_Familiar._ **

He glances over again.

Blue eyes glance back, bright, glowing softly-

The _walls_ become _trees_ and he feels his own eyeswiden _-_

He _runs,_ not sure if he’s trying to escape the vision, or chase it to see where it ends.

-

The run winds down after- he doesn't know how long, doesn't really care for the first time in-

Hydra learned to let him run. It was a loop track, nothing like this, but they _learned_.

You can’t tame a wolf, not completely.

He's corralled and separated from the pale gold wolf, directed back to his cell. It's familiar, even though he is not at Hydra or in Russia. The only thing that isn’t are the glowing blue eyes, even though they feel... 

The door stays shut, after. 

After the Soldier’s bones have broken and snapped and realigned themselves back into a smaller shape. After his body has returned to flesh and he feels _raw_ and _empty_ and _full_.

He sits, and waits, and listens to the sound of his blood pumping filling the silence, eyes trained straight ahead on the pale wall ( _pale gold_ ).

He waits.

\--

Steve looks out the window, fingers laced and hands hanging between his knees, forearms resting on his thighs, his heartbeat still sped up in his chest. He watches the sun rise and fall in the backdrop of the city and not for the first time, he’s still, still as the ice in the plane he crashed down even when his heart isn’t.

He pushes himself up when the sun sets, turning and heading for the elevator to take it down.

He’s just crashing another plane into the ice with this, maybe. But if it’s for Bucky, he’s more than willing to let himself sink into the depths with it.

 _(Again)_.

\--

The Winter Soldier’s eyes shift up when the door opens. 

The Captain watches him for a long minute before taking a slow step inside, the door sliding silently shut behind him. The Winter Soldier watches him right back, waiting, waiting for- something. Pain. Questions. Interrogation. The Captain moves and-

Winter Soldier blinks once, slow, to hide the surprise, and watches Captain America ( _ ~~St~~_ -) sit down against the wall opposite him, legs folded and hands resting on his knees, uniform back on.

His eyes catch on the Captain’s right hand briefly.

They sit in silence. The Soldier listens to their breathing, thinks one of them should be struggling to take in air.

 _ ~~It was always on the inhale~~_ -

“You know me,” The Captain says, and the Soldier’s eyes sharpen.

“I don’t,” he replies lowly. The Captain’s eyes don’t lose their resolve. The Soldier grits his teeth, can feel his jaw _ticking_.

“You _do_ ,” The Captain says, sounds so _sure_ -

“ _I DON’T_ ,” he snaps back, anger spiking, feels his teeth elongate. The Captain stares calmly back, jaw clenching just slightly.

The Soldier should kill him. Kill him now or use him as a means of escape. He shouldn’t be-

He should have completed his mission long ago. He’s taken too long. He’ll be punished for taking this long. Punished. _Electricity_ -

The Captain looks down and the Soldier’s muscles tense, getting ready to spring-

“I don’t remember everything,” The Captain says, voice quiet but not soft, just as he’s about to attack and the Soldier stills, brows furrowing a little, plan slipping. “I don’t…” The Captain trails off, fingers tightening where they’re gripping his knees, the right a little longer than the left (previous damage), “I know I led the Howling Commandos. I know I know _you_ ,” The Captain says, eyes shifting back up and drawing the Soldier out of his thoughts. 

The look _pins_ him in place and makes him... _frustrated_ that he’s pinned. Makes him feel _weak_. He’s not weak- 

“I know I’ve known you for-”

“ _Stop. Talking_ ,” the Soldier orders, voice a _growl_ barely kept in check, and The Captain’s lips flatten, fingers stilling on his knees. 

The Soldier’s control is slipping. _Why does his control keep slipping-_

“I know you,” The Captain continues, “Or I did,” he adds, quieter, and something _stills_ in the Soldier and _boils up_ , makes his nails lengthen and that restrained _growl_ reverberate at the back of his throat. The Captain stands and the Soldier tenses, growl ceasing, and watches the Captain watch him, feeling-

_Inadequate. Disappointment-_

“I knew you,” The Captain repeats, and now his voice _is_ soft (weakness. Baring his throat. The Soldier should _strike_ -) “You knew me.” The Captain turns to head for the door and panic seizes his chest, makes the thing in it he logically knows is his heart grow still, still as the dead bodies he leaves behind at the other end of his scope, still as the snow on the ground in a place far from here, still as it’s been for-

_For._

He doesn’t realize he’s moved until the The Captain freezes and he freezes, too, feels a mottled hand in his and stares, eyes wide and lips parted, just a little-

He feels-

 _Wind on his cheeks, snow falling, snow in his hair, snow falling into his eyes while he stares up_ -

He rips his hand away, hears-

 _Hears his own voice screaming while he falls_ -

A hand reaches out into his vision and he stumbles back like it belongs to something unknown and forbidden (he shouldn’t know. It’s not for him. _He shouldn’t know it_ ), lands ungracefully on his ass and skitters back on his hands and feet until his shoulder blades are pressing up against the wall and he stares, stares at nothing, stares at white, stares at the winter sky, stares at-

The Captain stares back, blue eyes wide and glowing faintly, like-

 _Like_ -

“Get out,” someone whispers, and then realizes it’s him when he repeats it, “Get out. _Get out_. _GET OUT!_ ” he shouts, eyes wide and chest heaving, and The Captain _jolts_ before jerking back like he’s been hit, the door already open behind him and quickly, silently sliding shut once he’s out of the room, taking his eyes- 

His eyes away-

The Winter Soldier tries to catch his breath, tries to slow it down, but-

There’s so much snow and he’s so cold, and he is lost.

\--

Steve stares at the door, breaths slow and shallow in the silence like he’s still got Bucky’s hand on his and he can’t move, he’s not supposed to move because Bucky might move away and- 

Steve slowly raises his hand, reaching out-

He stops, pulls it back then backs up until his back bumps into the wall, slowly sitting down on the floor and pulling his knees up.

He stays there for a long time.

-

He hears footsteps after- after a while, doesn’t bother lifting his head from where he’s let it hang.

“You know,” Tony starts, then stops, footsteps stopping with a soft _shush_ a foot away. Steve hears him shift, hears his fabric fold and crease when he takes a seat next to him, feels the warmth his body radiates and hears the sound of his heart beating steady in his chest, arc reactor faintly pulsing in time with it like white noise in the background to all that makes Tony tick, even while Steve knows _it_ is what makes Tony tick.

Tony doesn’t continue and Steve glances over.

“I don’t have anything to say after that,” Tony says, looking up at the ceiling, “Just seemed like the thing to say. You know. Like in movies.” 

Steve just looks at him for a moment before looking back down into the darkness of his lap.

It’s quiet for a minute.

“We should have a movie night,” Tony fills the silence with, “Catch you up. You probably haven’t watched any since you defrosted, have you.” 

It’s not a question. 

Steve sits up a little and tilts his head back, staring up at the ceiling too.

It’s quiet again, save for the sounds of their breathing and the alternating beating of their hearts.

“You really don’t remember?” Tony asks, and Steve feels eyes on him, feels the weight of it prickle none too gently on the side of his face. Of course Tony was listening. He cares more than people give him credit for, it seems.

Steve blows out a breath.

“No,” he answers. He doesn’t like answering questions. He’s tired of them. But he’ll answer that one.

“Guess that makes sense,” Tony replies, eyes sliding away, “I’m not an expert on defrosting people, but I know enough biology to know that that probably didn’t happen without some side effects. Everything has a price, so they say.”

Steve snorts a laugh, lets it grow loud and bitter. 

It starts slipping into hysteria and he forces himself to stop, the echoes of it still reverberating around his ribcage like a ball bouncing off of the skeletal walls.

 _Quiet_.

“Yeah,” Tony says, and Steve glances over to see the small, old, _tired_ smirk on his face, “We’re all pretty fucked up.”

Steve snorts another laugh, not bitter this time when it grows, and Tony joins in.

The quiet settles again, less uncomfortable now. It’s strange, how being with certain people will do that, sometimes even when you share your misery.

"I could try and make you forget," Tony offers, and Steve looks over again, "For a night." Tony waggles his eyebrows and Steve studies him, the playfulness staying on Tony’s face.

There’s still energy thrumming through him, under his skin, energy to _move_. Steve hasn't indulged it since 'waking', and didn't often after his mother-

Steve moves, throwing a leg over and straddling Tony’s lap. Tony’s eyebrows jump up and his hands automatically settle on Steve’s waist, warm and solid. Steve’s settle on Tony’s shoulders, mottled and smooth. Tony doesn’t flinch away from it, his right hand, just stares up at him while Steve stares back.

"Make me forget," Steve says, quiet in the hall. 

_Make me forget the man I love who doesn't remember me in the room behind me, make me forget it's not 1945, make me forget I can't remember being twelve, make me forget being something other than as lost and alone as I feel right now,_ Steve thinks desperately, _As lost and alone as I’ve felt since I came out of the ice._

It went away briefly, when he saw Bucky, the loneliness. But Bucky doesn’t remember him, and Steve doesn’t have _anyone_.

Tony’s expression settles and something in Steve settles too, and Steve bends down to press his lips to Tony’s, chapped and rough against his smooth.

He's still aware that Bucky...the Winter Soldier is in the room behind him, but he doesn't want to remember that to the man in there, to _Bucky_ , he's nothing, and that he's never been to Bucky what he’s always silently longed to be, what he’s wanted since-

Steve can’t remember.

Calloused hands push up under his shirt and Steve reaches down between them to undo the top of Tony’s jeans.

It makes him feel dirty, doing this here in the hall outside Bucky’s room, but he just wants to _feel_ something that isn't _hurt_ or _loss_ or being _alone_. He just wants...he just wants to _be_. He hasn’t _been_ in-

He can’t remember.

He can’t remember.


	7. Lookin for heaven, found the devil in me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, because they are werewolves and have wolf traits, there's going to be some A/B/O in this. I don't know how far it'll get into it besides possible knotting in the future, but, yeah. I'll update the tags if anything changes, or put a warning above the chapter _and_ update the tags.

He stares at the pale wall for two hours, has been counting each second in his head, each minute. Once he reaches one hundred and twenty, he stands.

_“Smells like shit, Buck.”_

_Bucky barks out a laugh, the guys joining in._

He walks, stops in front of the door The Captain ( _ ~~Ste~~_ -) enters and exits through, eyes slowly tracing the seams in the wall he’s been staring at for the past two days.

 _Forest- They’re running. They’re running_ -

He reaches a hand up, traces the seam on the right and then lengthens his nails, transforms his hand partway into a claw and pulls his arm back, _stabbing_ forward-

He repeats it, twice, _three times_ -

The fifth time, his nails embed between the door and the wall, spiderweb cracks splintering out-

\--

Steve rolls over, presses a hand to his face and slides it up into his hair, eyes cracking open and squinting before they adjust to the dark. He stares up at the ceiling for a while, just watching the lights and shadows before pushing himself up to sit-

“ _Sirs_ ,” JARVIS says, and Steve’s eyes snap up, “ _The Winter Soldier has escaped his cell._ ” 

Steve’s already launching himself off the bed while Tony jerks up with a, “ _Wuh?_ ” scooping up his uniform top and putting it back on haphazardly, ignoring the dried mess in his underwear while he dashes for the stairwell entrance, door _slamming_ into the opposite wall.

He hears another door slam open not too far above him and then bootsteps and pushes himself faster, trying to catch up. He hears another door and barely sees it closing a story above him and _leaps_ , catching the railing and vaulting over it in quick succession, throwing the door open where it’s fallen halfway shut.

Steve sees Bucky almost at the open construction section without the window panes and reaches a hand out while he runs.

“ _Bucky, don’t-!_ ” he shouts. _The shield’s still up,_ Steve thinks frantically. But Bucky _jumps_ and Steve’s heart stills in his chest-

Bucky doesn’t hit the shimmering wall. 

He doesn’t hit anything and Steve kicks back into gear, hears the elevator door slide open behind him and Tony’s footsteps but keeps going, running and _jumping_ out of the building right after Bucky, eyes tracking the shadow of him dashing across the neighboring rooftop. Steve lands in a roll and pushes himself back up on the end of it, taking off.

“ _Bucky!_ ” he calls, desperate, barely sees Bucky glance back over his shoulder before dropping down between two buildings. 

Steve follows right after him.

-

Steve pants, staring out at the city while his eyes dart around twenty minutes later. He hears Tony’s thrusters and then the heavy _thunk- **thud**_ of him landing six feet away, walking closer, hydraulics quiet but loud to him in the beginnings of early morning gray.

“I can’t-” Steve pants, dropping his head while he squeezes his eyes shut, fists clenching. He grits his teeth when Tony rests a hand on his shoulder, cringing inwards, trying to catch his breath.

\--

The Winter Soldier loops around three times just to make sure he’s not being followed, then changes direction and heads East, down towards the bridge. Once he can hear water, he stops, backing up to blend in with the early morning shadows of the nearest stoop in the nearest building and lets himself try to catch his breath, heart thudding a million miles a minute in his ears. 

Once he’s slowed it down enough to speak, he melts out of the shadows and heads to the nearest phone booth.

He picks up the phone, punching his fist into the metal coin holder and taking out what he needs to the sound of change littering the ground, sliding them into the machine.

_Dial tone._

_Tink-click._

“Alpha Zero-One reporting on mission status,” he reports into the phone. 

“ _Go ahead_ ,” a voice replies. Steady breathing. Average respiratory count.

“Mission incomplete. Encountered interference. Held in Stark Tower-”

 _Soft, glowing blue eyes widen_ -

He shakes his head.

“-for two days, five hours. Awaiting instruction,” he finishes.

 _The barely-there static of the phone line_.

“ _Location_ ,” the voice orders.

“Two miles west of Brooklyn Bridge,” he answers, glancing up and listing off the nearest street name.

“ _Await extraction_ ,” the voice instructs. The the line goes dead. Winter Soldier hangs up the phone and quickly blends back into the shadows.

_Mottled skin, previous damage-_

_Blue eyes widen-_

He slowly clenches his right fist.

He stares out in the direction of the water until a black car pulls up next to the curb around the corner he’s lurking on. He slips out, darting quickly into the backseat just before the sun starts peaking above the horizon, people starting to move about more.

He sits still while they pull away from the curb and head straight.

They eventually pull onto a street full of brownstones and Winter Soldier lays down in the backseat at the driver’s gesture, watching the trees go b-

 _They run, weaving around the trees_ -

The car’s engine cuts and he jolts just as a garage door _thuds_ shut, staring up at the garage ceiling outside the backseat window. He quickly gathers himself together just before the back door opens and sits up, scooting over and climbing out.

He follows the driver into the house and soon to a door, watches the man open it and then gesture. He steps into the darkness, taking the stairs down. 

The door closes behind him and takes most of the light with it.

He steps into the glow of sickly green light at the bottom, turning the brick stark and ugly. He walks forward and turns the corner around the end of the stairs, glancing briefly at the agents seated at their computers, briefly watches them glance at and watch him, too. 

Some of their eyes widen, fingers stilling briefly on their keyboards before they catch themselves.

They are young.

A man opens a door ahead on the other end of the room and he walks in, listens to its metal close securely and lock behind him.

He does not look at the chair in the corner.

A man stands from a desk on the other side of the room, eyes on him. He keeps his own just to the right of the man’s face.

“Reason for mission failure,” the man says, and the Winter Soldier bows his head slightly, eyes still off to the right.

“Encountered-”

“Where is your mask?”

He grits his teeth a little, feels them elongate, just slightly.

He retracts them quickly.

“Lost during combat,” he answers.

“With Iron Man?” the man asks. 

“Captain America,” he answers. Some of the agents shuffle their feet, all of them stiffen to varying degrees.

 _Quiet_. Just the sound of _heartbeats_ and _heartbeats_ and _his own_ and _metal_.

“Reason for mission failure,” the man repeats, but it sounds slightly different this time. Strained.

“The Asset was captured and put in containment,” Winter Soldier reports in monotone, still staring off to the side.

“Does the Captain know your identity?” 

He frowns slightly.

“Clarify reque-”

“Nevermind,” the man cuts him off, waving a hand. 

He wants to bite and tear it off.

His fingers give the faintest twitch.

“ _What do you think?_ ” the man asks, quiet. Winter Soldier is not supposed to hear, but he does. He always does. 

“ _I don’t think we should risk it,_ ” another agent replies, “ _We can’t do anything about the Captain, but if they’ve been in contact and the Captain’s seen his face_ -”

“ _It’s risky. We should_ -” another starts.

The man waves a hand and they all cease.

“Remove tactical vest and weaponry and sit in the chair,” the man instructs, and-

 _Blue eyes widen_ -

“-order, Asset.”

He straightens slightly, reaching up to comply-

The agents turn, two heading for the chair behind him. His hand stills briefly and he finds it’s settled on his knife, instead.

“What’s the hold u-”

 _Blue eyes widen_ -

 _Gurgle_. He turns quick and blood _splats_ against the wall, doesn’t realize he _has_ moved until he hears it hit, sharp and loud in his ears.

“ _What_ -” 

He rushes the second and slices his throat, too, then picks up the third and throws him into the fourth, running after them with his knife raised, blood dripping-

 _Blue eyes widen_ -

-

He trudges up the stairs, listens to his boots _thud_ heavily on the wood and then reaches for the door handle, turning it.

He steps into sunlight and hears a breath hitch, turns and darts into the man’s space just as the man’s drawing his gun-

He _crushes_ the man’s hand in his left and slits the man’s throat before he can do more than make the barest sound, hears the body drop before rushing into the other room, tracking down and following the sounds of heartbeats throughout the space.

-

He sits heavily at the kitchen table, setting his knife down, blade sticking out over the edge. He reaches down and takes the half eaten pancake off of the plate between his fingers, bringing it up and taking a bite, then another, then stuffs the whole thing into his mouth while he hunches over, chewing and swallowing as quickly as he can while he reaches for the scrambled eggs. He hears a _drip-drop_ and stills, glancing towards the faucet-

_“See! Look! Don’t need no plumber when I can do it myself!”_

_Ste- raises an eyebrow, lips quirking up on one side._

_“Don’t give me that look, Ste-ie, don’t doubt my plumbing skills.”_

_“Oh, I don’t doubt your ‘plumbing skills’,” Ste- teases, and Bucky rolls his eyes._

_“I’ll have you know those dames were **plenty** pleased-”_

_Ste- rolls **his** eyes._

He shifts his eyes from the sink once his vision clears and he doesn’t see any water dripping, watches it drip from his knife to the wood floor and then focuses back on the food on the table, swallowing the rest of the pancake in his mouth down while stuffing the eggs in by the handful like a starving mutt.

-

He finds a duffel and strips out of his uniform, fills the bag with guns between the body armor and pants and then pads over to the nearest body with the least amount of blood on it and starts tugging the clothes off.

-

He leaves all of the vehicles on the street and in the garage and walks, duffel bag over his shoulder like he’s just passing through. He walks down the street, hat pulled low, and keeps an eye on both sides of the street until he turns the corner.

Just a drifter passing through. Nothing to see.

-

He tries not to think past getting to somewhere more secure, but he gets the urge to turn around and go back and report in every five steps.

-

He takes a left, a right, ignores the trees and the dogs that move out of his path and keeps walking, walking, walking. He doesn’t know where he’s going.

No one’s come for him yet. He still has time.

-

The Winter Soldier ends up at the Brooklyn Bridge.

He stares out at the water, grip tightening on the duffel’s strap, and-

He shudders, just faintly, like he’s not made of ice, and turns away after another minute to keep walking.

-

He walks, walks, passes a park and keeps going. He snags a few hotdogs from a vendor and devours them while he heads- nowhere. Just keeps moving, eyes tracking early morning joggers, cars, pedestrians, bicyclists. He keeps walki-

He stops, last hotdog poised almost to his mouth, and stares at the advertisement. 

He takes a bite and keeps moving, looking back straight ahead.

-

He stashes his duffel behind a dumpster a block away and then circles back, walks up the stairs and pays his way into the Smithsonian Museum with pickpocketed cash he took off a man too busy arguing about bagels on his cellphone to notice.

They haven’t come for him yet.

He keeps his hat low while he follows the directions to the exhibit he’s looking for, avoids small, loud, running children and keeps his face turned away from the security cameras, subtly sliding his left hand into his jacket pocket. 

When he finds the exhibit, he stares at the curving mural of The Captain that greets him as he enters, then shifts his eyes forward and almost stutters to a stop.

He keeps walking.

A motorcycle. Height comparisons. Data. _Pictures pictures pictures_ and he turns-

He finally stops, breath stilling in his chest.

He walks closer, stopping again a couple feet away and staring up.

_A Fallen Comrade_

_[ When Bucky Barnes first met Steve Rogers on the playgrounds of Brooklyn, little did he know that he was forging a bond that would take him to the battlefield of Europe and beyond. ]_

_Born in 1916, Barnes grew up the oldest child of four. An excellent athlete who also excelled-_

He rips his eyes away and stares down at the video playing below the large picture of his- his face, watches-

Watches himself smile and laugh, shift in a way that shows no concern save for the moment, no weight but for deaths during a finished war, weighted and light in ways he cannot fathom. His eyes shift right and he watches The Captain ( _Steve Rogers_ ) laugh and smile, and does not recognize the lines on either of their faces, does not recognize- Does not-

He wishes it was in color.

_Blue eyes widen-_

\--

“I’m _fine, Tony_ ,” Steve says, hanging his discarded coat up, “No, I don’t need a Stark Phone- No, I don’t need that, either.” Steve pauses. “I’ll find him,” he replies, curling and uncurling his right set of fingers, “No. Nothing. No, I don’t-” he _sighs. “Goodbye_ , Tony.” Steve hangs up, setting the phone back on the charger on the bar before heading for the bathroom-

He _grunts_ quietly, hand going to his abdomen, and stares down at it, eyebrows drawing together at the brief stab of pain.

“What-”

He doubles over, wrapping his arms around his waist and gritting his teeth when the pain lances _harder_ , more like a punch to the gut, eyes flashing a soft glow.

“ _Now, Steve._ ”

He stills, vision blurring.

_“This time of the month is very important. I need you to listen.”_

_“I am, ma,” he replies, hands resting on the table._

_She reaches over and takes his hand gently, smiling softly. He tries to ignore the drop of disappointment in his chest. He thought he’d be a-_

_“You need to be very careful during the Heat, my love. Omegas are most vulnerable during those three days. Alphas don’t-”_

Steve cringes and doubles over again with a strangled sound out of the memory, pain _lancing_ up and out to his sides while he grits his teeth, can feel them lengthen. His phone rings and he jerks, making his way over and using the bar to keep himself up when his knees try to buckle. 

He checks the caller I.D. and manages to hit ‘ _answer_ ’ without knocking the charging stand over.

“ _Rogers, I’ve got_ -”

“ _I need three days_ ,” Steve struggles to get out, cutting Fury off, breathing picking up while the pain zips around and prickles straight up his spine. 

He squeezes his eyes shut.

“ _What_ -”

“ _I’ll call you then_ ,” Steve cuts him off again, doesn’t have the time to apologize. He leans heavily on the counter while he pants, can feel his cheeks starting to heat with the rest of his body. It’s getting too warm. He shudders. “ _Don’t come over. I need time. Body things. Just don’t_ ,” he manages, pushes ‘ _end_ ’ in the middle of Fury’s reply and hits the phone too hard, knocking the whole thing over with a _clatter-crash_ , hears it skid across the bar but ignores it. 

He reaches for his shirt, pulling it up and off while he pants, body growing hot. He nearly _trips_ trying to get his boots off while standing in place, one hand gripped on the counter. He finally yanks them off with an impatient growl and then stumbles in the vague direction of his bedroom, flushing at the feel of-

He stops.

There’s something between his-

He’s _wet_. 

He can smell it, faintly, under the layer of _outsideTowerTonyStarkbattle_ on his uniform pants. It smells...like flowers? No. Not quite flowers, not quite sweet food, some indistinguishable scent caught in between, but it smells _sweet_.

He undoes the top of his uniform pants while he keeps moving, reaching up and pushing his bedroom door open further while _grunting_ again at the pain. He leans on the doorframe, taking a moment and trying to slow his breathing, breathe through it-

He stills, catching the scent of-

He lifts his head a little, scenting the air.

Rain. And stone? And something cold. Ice…?

His body gives a shudder. 

It smells _good_ -

 _ **Thud**_.

Steve’s breaths stop with his heart and he slowly turns, looking back over his shoulder.

Bucky pulls his shirts up and off over his head, letting them drop to the floor with- 

Steve glances down briefly.

His bag, blue eyes focused on Steve, the glow starting slow from the inside out. Bucky lifts his head a little and starts scenting the air and Steve swallows.

“Buck,” he says, low and quiet, but loud enough for them, and Bucky lowers his head a little like he’s watching prey, shoulders hunched up a bit like a coiled spring. “Buck,” Steve repeats, a little firmer, wincing a little when the pain flashes-

Bucky _runs_ and Steve darts backwards into his bedroom, _slamming_ the door shut just as Bucky reaches out-

He hears a long _scratch_ on the other side of the door, just shy of heavy but missing light, and then-

Silence.

A _thump_ against the door and then the sound of _sniffing_.

 _Why now?_ Steve thinks desperately, cringing and bending a little when the pain shoots up his stomach, _I want him here but not **now**_.

He makes himself stand up straight before leaning on the door again. “Buck?” he calls through it, holding in a wince, stomach muscles twitching at the pain. 

The sniffing stops.

 _Silence_.

Steve holds his breath.

“ _Steve_ ,” he hears, rough and heavy through the door, and Steve’s _heart_ thuds. 

Another _thump_. 

He can hear Bucky- 

Hear him _breathing_ against the wood.

Steve leans closer, resting his temple against the door, forehead sliding slightly with sweat.

“Do you...remember anything?” Steve tries, holding his breath.

Silence.

“ _We...ran. Through a forest_ ,” Bucky answers, and Steve closes his eyes, “ _Like mirrors. My mirror_ ,” he adds, softer. Steve hears nails _scritch_ softly, dragging light against the wood. He holds in another wince at the...cramps, and raises his hand, settling it over the sound coming through the door.

“Do you know what we are?” Steve asks next, gripping the doorframe with his free hand when his knees try to buckle again, squeezing his eyes shut.

“ _Wolf_ ,” he hears, “ _Monster_ ,” quieter. “ _Beast_ ,” he hears on a low _growl_ and a shudder shivers through him, “ _Alpha Zero-One_.” 

Steve stills.

“‘Alpha’?” he asks.

Silence.

It sounds famil-

“ _ **Omega**_ ,” Bucky _breathes_ against the wood, and Steve suppresses another shudder.

_“Alphas don’t think clear during heat ruts, dear,” she says gently._

_“But-” Steve starts._

_“Not even Bucky,” she says kindly, “If you let him in, you two will-”_

“ _Smell good_ ,” Steve hears, drifting out of the memory again. He glances up, curling a little more in on himself when the pain shoots up his sides again, curving around his lower back. His pants feel almost soaked. 

His body trembles.

“You’re not thinkin’ clear,” Steve manages to get out, accent slipping out a bit.

“ _Want you_ ,” he hears, and Steve’s eyebrows draw together, eyes slipping closed again. He’s wanted to hear that for-

He can’t remember how long.

“That’s the rut talkin’, Buck,” Steve makes himself say, hears a breath _huffed_ against the door. And then it dawns on him, body stilling again regardless of the pain, neither of them have probably had a heat or rut in- “When was your last rut?” Steve asks.

 _Silence_.

“Buck?”

“ _Unknown_ ,” he hears, and Steve’s _heart_ hurts, “ _Gets in the way_.”

“Buck-”

“ _ **Gets in the way**_ ,” Bucky says more firmly, nails _scritching_ lightly against the door again, “ _Suppressed. Useless._ ” Steve’s eyebrows draw together _._

He’ll _burn_ them. Whoever did this to Bucky. He’ll burn _all_ of them for-

 _“Didn’t want it,”_ Bucky continues, _“Not without you_.” Steve’s breath catches and his eyes widen, staring at the door (wishes he could see _through_ it).

_“Just go! Get out of here!”_

_“No, not without you!”_

“You don’t remember everything,” Steve hazards, and the _scritching_ stills.

 _Silence_.

“ _Neither do you._ ”

Steve closes his eyes for a minute, panting softly against the door. The wetness in his pants is spreading; he can feel it slipping down between his cheeks. He knows what it’s for, now.

“No,” he agrees, almost a whisper, “But we can’t-...We can’t take this back, Buck. Winter Soldi- Whoever you are right now. We can’t do this without- We _can’t_ -” It’s getting harder to think. He can _smell_ Bucky through the door, just faintly, just like Bucky can probably smell _him_.

 _Fuck_ , this isn’t the time they should be doing this. Bucky disappeared from the Tower and Steve couldn’t find him and now he’s in _heat_ and what about Whoever had Bucky? What did they _do to him?_

 _Silence_.

“ _Steve_ ,” he hears, so _soft_ -

 _This might be it_ , Steve thinks, vision going unfocused, _This might be who we are for the rest of our lives. And Bucky- What if he was **sent** by Them? Whoever did this. What if they’re using him to- What if they both remember and don’t want this anymore? What if they- What if they **do** want it? What if- He’s wanted to be Bucky’s for as long as he’s able to **remember** , and it’s not like- He’s never wanted to join a pack, if they even exist. He’s never wanted to- Not...not really. He just wants-_

Steve slows his breath and closes his eyes, and counts slow in his head: 

_One._

_Two._

_Three._

_Four._

_Five._

_Six._

_Seven._

_Eight._

_Nine._

_Ten._

He looks down at the door handle for a long moment and then slowly moves his hand, lets go of the doorframe and wrap his mottled fingers around it. He stares at it for another minute, trying to think, trying to-

The _pain_ shoots up and he turns it and _pulls_ , shifting back a little, free arm wrapping around his middle.

Bucky- The Winter Soldier- stares back, teeth sharp and eyes glowing bright even in the day. 

Bucky watches him close and Steve watches him right back, both of their chests heaving. 

Steve lets go of the door handle, lets the door open the rest of the way on its own and swallows when Bucky starts moving in close, doesn’t move away, lets Bucky take his face in his hands and kiss him, soft then _desperate_ then _**hungry**_. 

Steve lets his eyes close and grips him back, _gasping_ into it before swallowing down Bucky’s _growl_ , letting Bucky back him up into the bedroom. Bucky’s hands slide down his chest and stomach, sending a shudder down Steve’s spine with it, then start undoing his pants-

There’s a loud _bang_ from another part of the apartment and then footsteps flooding in, multiple heartbeats and metallic parts _clicking_. 

He can hear it but Bucky’s hands are on him. He can hear it but Bucky smells so-

“ _Rogers!_ ”

Steve _jolts_ a little, eyes opening halfway while Bucky’s mouth drags down over to his jaw. He looks over Bucky’s shoulder.

Fury stares back, Agent Carter at his side with seven other agents, all guns pointed at them.

“Step away from the target,” Fury orders, and Steve’s brows slowly draw together.

 _Target?_

Bucky’s teeth drag light down the side of his neck, can feel them elongate just a little more and Steve’s eyes flutter shut again while he tilts his head back with a soft _moan_ , tightening his grip, Bucky’s scent filling his no-

Nine metal _clicks_ go off and Bucky _jolts_ with a _grunt_ , staggering away a step. Steve’s eyes snap open, gripping onto him and stumbling a little with him.

“What-” Steve tries while Bucky half turns with a _snarl_ , and Steve feels the hands on him start to shift to _claws_ , hears the bones _snapping_ -

Bucky _jolts_ again with another shot and then drops to the floor. Steve tries to catch the doorframe with a hand but ends up falling to his knees with him, hands hitting the floor and bending over Bucky’s body on his hands and knees.

“ _Buck_ ,” Steve tries, vaguely hears footsteps approach.

“We’re taking you both in,” Fury’s voice says, but all Steve can see is Bucky’s eyelids closing over the soft glow of his eyes-

The bodies close in and hands haul him to his feet.


	8. With blood and lust in his eyes. With blood and lust in your eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for: Sex.

“How’s he doing?” Fury asks. 

Sharon frowns, shaking her head a little while she stares into the room.

“Hasn’t changed since we put him in,” she replies.

Captain Rogers curls up tighter in on himself on the bed. She can see the shaking from here.

“The other one?” Fury asks next. She flicks a switch and they both look up to the monitor above the viewing window.

The wolf paces the length of the room, back and forth, back and forth, metal paw _clanking_ softly on the cement through the speakers.

“Still the same, as well,” she reports, and Fury nods.

“Keep monitoring their vitals,” he says, and she nods, watching him stare into the room for a moment before turning to go. She flicks on the intercom.

“Captain Rogers, can you hear me?” she asks softly. His hearing seems to be more sensitive now, they’d found, and they can only assume his other senses are, as well.

He twitches once on the bed and then curls up tighter, eyes squeezed shut and arms wrapped around his middle, a tight ball on the bed. 

“Steve?” she tries. He turns his face towards the sheets.

“ _B-Buck_ ,” she hears, faint but strained and barely there. She turns the intercom off, sighing quietly, and glances up at the wolf still pacing on the monitor.

“Sorry, Steve,” she says to no one at all.

\--

_It’s here it’s here it’s here he’s here he’s here somewhere somewhere._

_Soft- **clank** soft- **clank** soft- **clank**._

_Somewhere in here_ , he thinks, eyes slowly roaming the walls, the corners, the door every time he heads back towards it.

Five locks, reinforced steel. 

He can’t pick it. He doesn’t have the patience. He can barely think past _OmegaOmegaOmegaSteveOmega **Somewhere**_ , blood flooded south and senses heightened so high he’s hallucinating the smell of another...wolf, somewhere.

 _Somewhere_ , his mind whispers, and he paces back towards the wall.

 _Somewhere_.

_**Find it.** _

He darts around and charges towards the door, throwing his metal shoulder into it, body _thudding_ heavily against the metal. He darts towards the other end of the cell- _cage_ and repeats it, vaguely hears a voice overhead and ignores it, hits the door again, again, _again again again again againagain **againagainag**_ -

Metal _squeal- **screeches**_ and then he and the door fall out, metal _ **thudding**_ heavy against the floor while he rolls to his feet and takes _off_ straight for the next door, barreling through that one, too while alarms go off above his head, red lights flashing off white walls and gray floor. He _runs_ down the hall, scenting the air, runs, runs, _runsrunsruns **runs**_ -

_Somewhere. He’s **somewhere.** Find it find it **findhim.**_

He catches faint traces on a whiff and takes a sharp left, nails scratching against the floor.

\--

It hurts. 

Everything _hurts._

His body _spasms_ and Steve curls in as tightly as he can, panting, fingernails digging into his own back, can feel warmth seeping from the barely-there sting of the wounds, from _lower_ , can feel it slowly trailing over the backs of his thighs, can feel it soaking into the sheets, can _smell it_.

 _God_ , it _**hurts**_. 

He didn’t _remember this_. He wants- wants-

He heard a voice earlier, sounded like his ma’s. He told her what he wanted. _He told her_.

She never let him and Bucky be together during his heats, though. He doesn’t need to remember everything to know that. He and Bucky were never together, not ever, and Steve never told him-

Something _blares_ , loud and repetitive and Steve’s body gives a full _twitch_ , hand flying to his ear while he tries to press the other down further against the bed with a hard _groan_ that trails off into a _whine_ , can’t curl up any harder even though he’s _trying to_. 

Something _thuds_ across the room an indiscernible time later and Steve tries to mov-

He grunts and curls back up, groaning again in the back of his throat. He cracks his eyes open instead, but all he sees is almost blindingly white sheets and white walls. He hears two more _thuds_ and then a heavy _crash **clang**_. 

_I’m too vulnerable like this_ , Steve thinks frantically, even in the hazy fog of heat, _I can’t fight like thi_ -

The smell _hits_ _him_ and Steve’s mouth _waters_ , letting out a _groan_ for a completely _different_ reason while his eyes slip closed, savoring it. 

There’s a metallic _thump_ and then _scraping_ , almost as bad as nails on a chalkboard, and then the mattress dips a moment later and Steve turns his head just enough to look, each pant filling his nose with that _scent_.

Bucky stares down at him, eyes white-blue electric, intent and brighter in the frame of his dark hair. He leans down and rubs their cheeks together, chest and stomach pressing against Steve’s shoulder and hip, something hard nudging against his asscheek and leaving a trail of wet. Steve makes a sound in his throat and spreads his legs a little, and Bucky retreats, bends down low and _scents him_. Bucky’s tongue licks at him once, a rumble low in his chest, and Steve _shudders_ , cock so hard it _hurts_.

Bucky shifts back up, bites at and drags sharp teeth over the skin of his hip, his side, his shoulder. He feels Bucky shift a little on the bed and then that hard something nudging at his entrance. 

Bucky’s cock slides up between his cheeks once, coating it in Steve’s slick, then slides back down and starts pushing _in_.

Steve’s back arches a bit, mouth falling open on silence as Bucky slides in, in, _in_ -

Bucky’s hips gently bump his ass once he’s all the way inside and Steve lets out the breath caught in his chest on a long, low _moan_ , shudders when it mixes with the sound of Bucky’s low _growl_. Bucky’s hips pull back and Steve feels them bump against his ass again, again, slow for a few moments before quickly picking up the pace. Steve cracks his eyes open where they’ve fallen shut just in time to watch Bucky bend over him, barricading Steve in with his arms and mouth going to Steve’s jaw, his throat, nose pushing up under Steve’s ear when Steve tilts his head back, breathy moans huffing gently past his parted lips. 

This is what he wanted, what he _wants_ , what he _wantswantswants **needs**_ , pain fading and shifting into pleasure that prickles and sparks up his spine to the backs of his eyes, Bucky’s low, reverberating growls so close to his ear making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. Steve gets lost in the slide of Bucky’s cock inside, in and out, in and out, smoother than his own fingers and it makes him _dizzy_.

After a minute, Bucky changes the angle and hits something inside of him and Steve lets out a _shout_ , turning his head to bury half his face into the bed while his hand whips out, grabs Bucky’s metal wrist and grips on tight.

There’s _banging_ mixing with the sound of the _blaring_ but it’s all background to how Steve _feels_ , how they sound together, their skin slapping wet and loud, Bucky’s groans and grunts all tinged or overwhelmed by _growls,_ his body rocking gently with the force of Bucky’s thrusts and Bucky’s cock moving inside, filling him in ways he didn’t know the need _was_ until now. 

Anything outside of this is all background to how it feels to finally be _full_. Even without all of his memories, Steve knows he’s never felt this, never had it. This is his it’s his it’s _theirs_ this alpha is _**his**_.

Bucky keeps thrusting, keeps hitting that spot and the heat is so dizzying, building, _building_ like _fire_ at the base of his spine, pooling, building, ready to burn him up _alive_. He can feel a swell starting, slowly stretching him wider, _wider_ , bites at the sheets and feels his teeth go clean through them.

Five more hard thrusts into that spot and the heat _surges_ and _spikes_ and Steve comes with a _**shout**_ , clenching down _tight_. Bucky shifts quick to lay behind him and thrusts once more, twice, and then _he_ comes with a loud, growled _grunt_ , teeth pressing to the top of Steve’s shoulder and body tense behind his and Steve tenses in response, stretching his neck out, wants his alpha’s teeth, wants them buried in his flesh, wants to be _his_ -

The teeth pull away and lips press to the back of his shoulder instead and Steve goes slack, tension _snapping_ , knot swelled tight inside him.

There’s a louder _**bang** scrape_ and the vague sound of footsteps flooding into the room, but Steve doesn’t care, _can’t care_ , trying to catch his breath while he just... _feels_. Bucky noses at the back of his neck and Steve shudders, curling back into him while Bucky’s arms wrap around his front, pulling him tightly back to his chest.

“ _Well...shit_ ,” someone says.

But Steve just lets himself doze, surrounded by Bucky’s scent.

\--

He hears voices talking when he starts to stir again, but his nose is still full of the alpha’s scent and he turns after the alpha pulls out, noses at him while he lifts his leg again and makes a soft sound when the alpha tugs his hips forward. 

The voices spike and he lets out another sound when the alpha’s cock slides back in, soothing the burning ache that’s slowly started to spread throughout his arms and legs, up the back of his spine and down below his stomach. The voices become background and all he can focus on is…

Is...

\--

“ _-ouldn’t separate-”_

_“-can’t-”_

_-_

_“-emory. He might not be as agreeable when he wak-”_

_-_

_“-ould do? Lock them up toge-”_

_“-ine for now. Jus_ -”

\--

Stevegroans softly, stretching with another, sore muscles pulled out and stretched taut. He curls back up for a minute after before slowly trying to blink his eyes open, trying to…remember…He scents the air and closes his eyes again, sighing softly as that scent ( _rainstoneice_ ) relaxes him all over agai-

His eyes snap open and he quickly sits up, half turning to look behind him.

Bucky’s eyes snap open barely a millisecond later and he sits up, too, staring back. 

“Bu-” Steve starts, before a door _bangs_ open and Steve jerks his head around, turning-

“Finally,” Fury says, only slightly exasperated (which means he’s really probably _tremendously exasperated_ ), “Escort the Winter Soldier back to his cell. Rogers, we need to talk. Put some clothes on.” An agent shuffles forward holding a set of folded clothes while the others all file in, guns trained.

“Fury, what- Wait!” Steve lets out as the agents slowly work their way closer. He feels Bucky tense behind him before going loose, slowly slipping off the bed from around him- “Buck-”

Bucky glances back at him briefly before stepping forward and letting the agents lead him out. 

Steve watches his naked back retreat around a corner. 

He quickly climbs off the bed to follow and the rest of the agents’ guns train on him. He stills.

“Put some clothes on, Captain,” Fury says, more an order this time, and Steve looks back to the doorway before turning to the agent offering out the clothes, their cheeks a little colored and eyes firmly on his face, smelling of-

Oh.

Steve takes the clothes and doesn’t bother turning around as he pulls them on, eyes on the door.

\--

They lead him...somewhere, not the way he vaguely remembers coming, and he tries to focus on that instead of- Instead of the moans he can still hear, the heat he can still feel, the breaths panted across his mouth and the tantalizing scent all over him from the omeg-

 _Steve_. The Captain. Steve Rogers.

(“ _Stevie_ ”).

They turn another hall and he catches the barest, fading scent of another wolf, barely there at all. 

He darts his eyes around, trying to find the source.

It’s not lingering, but it smells harsh, hard in a way he can’t-

_Lips curve up and red trail out over the bottom one, coating teeth red._

_Click_.

He blinks and keeps walking, glancing over briefly at one of the guns trained on him. The agent it belongs to stares back, stone faced and calm.

The wolf scent isn’t The Captain’s nor his, which means there’s another wolf lurking around. Is it S.H.I.E.L.D.’s? Hydra’s? 

Does it matter?

They escort him into a different cell and toss a set of clothes onto the cot, door _banging_ shut behind him. He roams his eyes over the walls, the small cameras in the corners and the door, studying.

He walks over to the cot and takes a seat, ignoring the clothes.

This cell is meant to hold someone like him. He wonders if it was meant for Rogers.

\--

“Care to explain why I spent the last three days forced to keep you and the Winter Soldier on lockdown while you went at each other like rabbits?” Fury asks, raising an eyebrow. 

Steve sighs. “It’s because I went into heat,” he answers.

“That’s what we suspected,” Fury says, pausing pointedly, “You didn’t mention it before when it would have been good to know.”

“It would have been good for me to _remember_ it before it _happened_ ,” Steve snaps back testily. 

Fury inclines his head slightly. “You know we couldn’t keep letting you use the Dream Dive equipment. Any longer and it would have had its consequences.”

 _Maybe it would have been worth it,_ Steve thinks, frowning. “What are you going to do with Bucky?”

“The Winter Soldier?” Fury asks, and Steve can’t help a low growl. Fury raises his other eyebrow slowly and sits back in his chair. “We have some questions for him.” Which means interrogation. “After that, we’re sending him to another facility for further assessment.”

“Which _means?_ ” Steve presses. 

“Above your clearance, Captain,” Fury replies, and Steve growls again. Fury shakes his head a little. “We’re not planning to lock him up and throw away the key, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“You’re treating him like a _criminal_ ,” Steve growls out. Fury sighs.

“Regardless that for all intents and purposes he _appears_ to be Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes,” Fury starts, Steve interrupting with an, “ _He is_ ,” “We still need to confirm it and we still need to assess how he survived the fall of 1944, who’s had him this whole time and why they’re after Stark, and _why_ and _how_ he became the Winter Soldier in the first place,” Fury finishes. Steve frowns, opening his mouth to argue- “And if you happen to know anything that you’re currently keeping from me,” Fury adds, raising an eyebrow again, “I need to know it, Captain.” Steve closes his mouth, sitting up a little straighter in his chair.

He’s not sure whether he should tell Fury about what happened at the Tower or not, but…

Bucky not remembering _is_ important, but whether he can _trust_ Fury with that information is something else entirely.

Steve’s so focused on thinking, he doesn’t hear anyone at the door until there’s a double _knock_.

He turns a little towards the door when Fury calls whoever it is to come in.

It opens near silent and barely there footsteps walk in, a woman with red hair-

Steve frowns, turning a little more. He scents the air.

_Nothing? No...wait. There’s... **something**. Barely._

“Captain Rogers, this is Agent Romanoff,” Fury introduces. Romanoff closes the door behind her.

_“I’m amazed you got it so quickly. It took me eight times just to get the whole maze memorized, and I’ve got the third highest score.”_

_“Who’s at the top?”_

_“Agent Romanoff. You beat her score. Expect a visit.”_

_“She doesn’t like losing?”_

_“Just...expect the unexpected,” Sharon replies cryptically._

_Little to no scent isn’t exactly what I had in mind_ , Steve thinks, glancing to Fury when he speaks up.

“You noticed,” Fury says, not asks, and Steve looks back to Romanoff, who slowly walks over and stops next to Fury’s desk, eyes not leaving his and Steve’s not leaving hers. “Agent Romanoff is something we’ve categorized as a hybrid,” Fury explains, and Steve’s eyes widen, just a little, because it’s- “You’re not wholly surprised,” Fury observes, and Steve relaxes again, just slightly, curling the fingers of his right hand.

“It’s not unheard of,” he replies slowly, sees Fury nod in his periphery. There’s a pause and Steve puts it together. “You think this has something to do with Bucky,” he concludes, slowly glancing to Fury, briefly, before his eyes are back on her. He can’t trust her not to do anything, especially if she’s even _part_ wolf. That makes her wolf enough and he can’t smell her intentions, which might have been the point of her from whoever...made her this. She’s nearly undetectable.

“Yes,” Fury replies, “I do. And we need to find out all we can _while_ we can.” Steve lowers his head a little, eyes shifting back to Fury, can see the glow of them reflected off of the window behind Fury’s chair.

“ _If you do anything to him_ ,” Steve warns, voice low, “ _Banner won’t be the only one you don’t like angry_.” 

Fury inclines his head again. “Good to know,” he replies. 

Steve looks at him for another few moments before shifting his eyes back to Romanoff.

She hasn’t looked away from him once. 

\--

His head jerks to the side with the hit and he shifts his jaw slightly, clenching and unclenching it, testing. 

Nothing broken.

He looks back straight ahead.

The agent steps away, pulling a phone out while exiting the room, the door locking shut behind him.

He tests his bonds again, keeping still when he feels a slight shift.

The agent comes back into the room one hundred and ten seconds later.

“We’re going for a ride,” the agent informs him, then five more fill the room and haul him up from the chair.

-

He holds still when they put the bag over his head, glancing around quickly just before everything flips to black, and scents it briefly before stopping, trying not to wrinkle his nose at the strong smell of vinegar. He holds still when they put the earmuffs over his ears, everything going muffled. 

The only senses he has left are touch and taste.

Thirteen agents.

He walks one hundred and forty steps before moving up an incline, hands on his arms. They force him to sitting and he complies, back straight.

He licks briefly at the bag over his head, keeping the cringe off his face.

Underneath all of the vinegar, there’s...gunpowder. Metal? River water. Fuel.

Something starts to rumble, low vibrations rippling up through him from below.

Quinjet.

Thirteen agents and a quinjet.

His stomach does a small swoop.

They’ve taken off.

He tests the bonds again, transforms his hands slightly and feels another shift in the metal, greater, this time.

He’ll have to be quick.

\--

“You’re wary of me,” Agent Romanoff states. Steve turns away from looking over himself in the mirror.

No bites. Bucky didn’t bite him.

“My lack of scent bothers you,” she states next, and he glances over at her.

“Do you know?” he asks, watching her, “How it works.”

“I can smell you just fine,” she says, a half answer, her lips curving up, small and miniscule. Steve feels his cheeks warm and her eyes flash briefly, bright and cyan, amused.

“I need to see Bucky,” Steve says after a moment, and her smile curves up a little more. 

Overcompensation? Is she trying to hide another response? He doesn’t know her well enough to tell and he can’t _smell_ _her_.

She opens her mouth and then her phone goes off and she quickly pulls it out, answering, “Sir.” Steve barely hears, “ _the Winter Soldier’s escaped_ ,” before he’s taking off for the door, dodging right and barely making it past Romanoff when she moves to intercept him. He vaguely hears her let out a curse before following.

Steve heads for the nearest way outside, then stops when he catches Romanoff darting down a different direction out of the corner of his eye. He skids to a stop and turns around sharply to follow, taking a hard right and barely catching the elevator doors closing.

He stays still long enough to see where she gets off before _slamming_ the door open into the stairwell, taking the floors at a leap.

He slams the roof door open once he reaches it and runs to the perimeter railing, only glancing briefly at Natasha standing by it before his eyes focus on something small in the distance. Steve slows to a stop, hands rising to grip the railing next to her.

“Buck,” he says, hair fluttering in the wind, and she shifts in his periphery. “You knew I’d follow,” he states. She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t need to.

“We have a tracker on the quinjet,” she finally says, turning towards him. He finally drags his eyes away to look at her. Bright cyan stare back. “You’re compromised.” 

She turns to go. He looks back out towards the jet, vaguely aware of the roof door closing with a _click_ behind him.

She’s right. He is.

\--

He pries the top panel of his arm open and elongates his nails, carefully reaching inside past wires and circuitry. As soon as he finds it, he gently _yanks_ it out and flicks it into the co-pilot seat, closing the arm panel and moving to the back.

He grabs his bag and shoulders it, moving to the front to check the jet scanner before heading to the back hatch, pulling his hat down after hitting the button for it. 

As soon as the jet’s low enough over forestry, he jumps.


	9. Yellow lines and tire marks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's quieter. Brought on and inspired by this post; http://shaishwrites.tumblr.com/post/127675044180/capsuniform-mcu-aesthetics-james-buchanan

He walks. 

The trees smell old, like old guns and on-the-verge-of-collapse houses out in the country, but...living, like he supposes he is now. They sway slightly in the wind that would try to knock him down if it could, if he weren’t sheltered by the trees, a temporary guest in their acres.

He walks.

He doesn’t let himself think about The Captain, Steve Rogers (“ _Stevie_ ”). He focuses on clearing the trees, ears and eyes focused. They’ll come for him, all of them: S.H.I.E.L.D., Hydra, Rogers. 

He needs to leave this place.

He takes food and water where he can on his way out of what appears to be D.C. It doesn’t really matter where he is, just that he’s too close to people after him and he’s been in one place for far too long, one place full of too many people, too many eyes and ears and phones. He skirts streets and sticks to alleys when he can, nose filled with things rotting and rotted, and aims for north, head down and eyes and ears open.

-

He avoids hitchhiking. It’s easier to when the people driving want to avoid hitchhikers, and not too hard to wave off the scarce few that try to offer him a ride. As soon as he hits forest on the side of the highway, he turns left and heads into the trees, disappearing behind trunks and bushes. The sounds of the highway fade out, buffered and blocked by the woods, and he glances over his shoulder to make sure he can’t see the road before dropping his bag and stripping his clothes off, stuffing them into the duffel.

He shifts, bones cracking and extending, snapping and realigning. He drops to his knees and buries his lengthened nails and fingers into the earth, lips parting and teeth elongating while he sucks in air.

He carries the bag by the straps between his teeth and runs, waves around trees and tries to let the memories from running in the Tower drift and settle ( _weaving around trees with_ -). When he reaches the edge of the trees again, he shifts back.

And he walks.

-

The bell chimes loud above the door when he pushes inside, sharp in his ears, and he keeps his head down, bag over his shoulder. He smells food and grease and perfume, chemicals, plastic seats, exhaustion. 

He heads over and takes the empty booth in the far corner, slides in and sets his bag down next to him on the side closest to the window. A waitress wanders over after a minute, pad of paper and pen in her hands, shoes quietly _squeaking_ every so often against the linoleum floor. The perfume smell comes closer with her, the chemicals in her makeup, mixing with the smell of cigarette smoke long burned into the tabletop even though he can’t see it.

He looks up, sliding his left hand into his pocket.

“Coffee. Black,” he says. She doesn’t bother writing it. He listens to her steps retreat and voices talk towards the other end of the diner, listening, listening for a way past the border patrol up ahead. 

He doesn’t know how there is one, just that there is.

He wraps his hand around the cup after she comes back and sets it down, glass hot in his palm. It smells bitter and strong and the heat sends a small shudder up his spine. He can’t...remember the last time he felt-

 _A body arching against his, slick and hot around his_ -

He blinks the memory away and brings the cup to his lips, sipping. 

It’s too hot, but he doesn’t care. It’s the first thing he’s had out of choice; the first time he’s had coffee in-

 _He turns and grins, the smell of coffee sharp and warm in his nose_ -

He blinks the fading memory away, too, and takes another sip, setting the glass down with a soft _clink_ against the top of the table, listening.

A high pitched _shout_. 

He glances over.

Children jump up on the seats in the middle of the diner a few tables from the door, the parents scolding and silverware scraping against used plates. 

He finishes the coffee, pays, and leaves, the bell ringing above the door when he steps back out into the cold air. He turns right and heads for the blue car at the end with the sticker of a line of a family of stick figures on the back window, just around the corner. 

He rounds to the back and stops at the trunk and glances up, leaning slightly to the side to check that the family inside and anyone else in the area isn’t paying attention. He elongates his nails and _jabs_ them _,_ wedging them into metal.

-

He closes his eyes, engine rumbling up through the metal all along his side, rattling his bones. The family talks, sings; the children loud and then quiet in random bursts and intervals over the expanse of time in the dark. The parents talk low, about their destination, about nothing. It’s rarely quiet, just the sound of the engine, and he doesn’t sleep, but he rests, listening.

He keeps his eyes closed when he hears more cars start to gradually converge outside, getting closer, _closer._ He reaches over and rests his fingers on the metal, lengthening his nails and focusing his hearing. The car slows and he holds his breath, listening.

They move slow, engine idling for five minutes, ten, move _slow_ , engine idling, _slow_. After an hour, he hears a voice full of instruction and holds his breath again, hears the mother replying.

Cars idling around them, _moving_ , _idling_ -

The car starts to move, slow at first before gradually picking up speed, and he opens his eyes to the dark, letting out a slow breath.

They drive for another thirty minutes before the car starts to slow, taking a right turn and then a left, the back of the car dipping briefly before evening out again. 

The car slows and comes to a stop, jolting slightly before he feels the gears shift. 

The children start to stir and then the sound of talking and seatbelts. A car door opens, then another and another and another. 

_Thunk-thunk, thunk. Thunk._

Fading voices and then-

Nothing.

He shifts his nails on the metal and pops the trunk open, slowly easing it open a crack to look, listen, before gradually opening it further.

He darts his eyes around, checking that it’s clear before slowly climbing out, keeping the trunk lid as low as he can. He grabs his bag and closes the trunk, looking up towards the restaurant.

The family’s inside at the counter, kids jumping and clinging to their mother’s legs. One wraps an arm around a small set of shoulders and the other lifts the smaller one up, holding the child to her and swaying gently with the child’s energetic swinging.

He looks around again before crossing the parking lot, walking up the sidewalk and stopping at the crosswalk. He crosses, head down, bag on his shoulder, and heads straight for the woods, eyes and ears open.

He strips as soon as he can’t see the street and shifts, bag handles back between his teeth and weaving through trees, dirt turning to leaves turning to snow under his paws.

\-----

Steve stares at the handles, pressing his lips a little firmly together. He reaches a hand out-

He stops, lowering it back to his side with a quiet sigh. He turns his head and scents his shoulder, shuddering faintly.

 _Bucky_.

He stands there for a long few minutes, starting a little when he hears the door open to the room and reaches forward to turn the handle, cool water spraying down.

He reaches for the soap.

\--

“Some supplies were missing from the quinjet,” Hill reports, “Weapons, a S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform, a bag. We also found a tracking chip left on the co-pilot seat. No known manufacturer, but the tech looks Russian.” 

Fury steeples his fingers. “Any possibility of tracing it?” he asks.

“We’re trying to track the various parts used,” Hill answers, “We should know all we can about it within the hour.” Fury nods. “And Captain Rogers?” she asks. Fury leans back in his chair.

“Romanoff and Carter are keeping watch.”

\--

Steve glances over his shoulder briefly and holds in a sigh, shoving his hands down a little further in his pockets. He turns left and pulls one out to push the door open and step inside, coffee and sugar and perfume and _people_ wafting into his nose. 

It’s a little better than outside, but worse, too.

He stands in line and waits his turn, spends it trying to root out all the different coffee scents in the shop instead of the human ones, and then places his order. He takes his drinks outside.

Steve picks a table off to the side towards the end of the building and takes a seat, setting the second drink down across from him and taking a sip of the first. After a couple minutes, she takes the seat across from him and wraps smooth fingers around the styrofoam cup.

“You should try the Iced Americano,” Romanoff says, raising the cup. She scents it for a moment before pursing her lips against the lid and tilting it back, taking a swallow. 

He gives her a look. “ _Ha. Ha._ ”

“No, it’s a real drink,” she teases, eyes on him. He rolls his own, just a bit.

He takes another contemplative sip before setting his cup down. 

“I already told Fury that I’m going to look for him,” he says, “And that I don’t need a bodyguard,” he adds pointedly.

“Who said I was your bodyguard?” she asks, watching him almost lazily over the top of her cup.

“Not you,” he corrects, shifting his cup a little on the table, “You’re my shadow.” Her lips curve up and he raises his cup to take a sip. 

The sun makes her hair bright, not quite like blood pooling on the floor, not quite like fire burning up the daylight. 

“I can smell Carter a mile off,” he says into the tin of people chattering all around, “They’d have to send you to keep an eye on me outside of my apartment.”

She doesn’t say anything and he doesn’t let that pressure him into saying more, just takes another swallow of his coffee, letting the sprawling fields and sunlight slide smooth down his throat, watching her watch him watch her. She sets her cup down with a barely there _thunk_ , sound muffled in the buffer of human voices.

“You’re going to try and find him,” she states, eyes sharpening. He keeps himself from reacting. “And you won’t be able to. I know. I’ve tried.” His eyebrows rise and she shifts her own cup in the start of a small, tight circle on the tabletop. He slowly lowers his back down.

“You’ve seen him before,” he says, not a question, putting the pieces together.

“I was escorting a scientist out of Iran,” she says, “Someone shot out our tires and we went over a cliff. I pulled us out, but the Winter Soldier was there.” Steve’s grip tightens on his cup. “You won’t find him,” she repeats, casual and sure. 

She raises her cup up to take a sip.

It hurts, that she’s so sure, that...hopeless feeling in his chest swelling and slowly working on sinking like a stone. 

Steve forces it aside.

But it’s also reassuring to know that if S.H.I.E.L.D. couldn’t find Bucky then, they’re not likely to find him now. Although…

His stomach churns and _drops_ , that hopelessness and fear and anger making the coffee sit unsettled in his stomach.

“And whoever had him?” Steve asks, “We still don’t know _who_ they are.”

Romanoff holds his stare.

“There’s nothing anyone can do about that,” she answers, and his grip tightens, styrofoam creaking and _caving_ in like a feather in his hand. “We’re doing what we can,” she continues, “Trying to find them _and_ him before anyone else.” She looks at him for a long moment and he presses his lips into a firm line.

She stands from her chair and walks past him. He hears the trashcan lid _bang_ softly but loud like a sonic boom in his ears and swears they could _pop_ , coffee stained over his glove and dripping like rain over the edge of the table.

Maybe it’s too slow for that; maybe it’s more like tears than rain.

Her steps retreat and blend in with the various others on the sidewalk and Steve stares down at the table, gritting his teeth and curling his fingers into a fist, leather stretching over his knuckles, the quiet _creak_ lost to the sound.

\--

He runs quick, paws kicking up snow in a flurry, then skids to a stop, sending snow spraying up as his teeth _snap_ shut and _clamp_ down, blood squirting in his mouth. He pants through his nose, trying to-

His head snaps up and he swivels his ears, breaths slowing while he listens. 

He slowly turns his head, eyes scanning the trees, the bushes, the thicket while the rabbit sways gently where it’s hanging from his mouth, the scent of blood going cool in his nose.

He slowly lowers his head after a solid minute of checking his surroundings and starts tearing into his meal, skin stretching and bone snappingbetween his teeth. It’s messy but efficient, familiar, even, like a blade going through intestines. 

He pulls those out and chews, turning his head from side to side to keep an eye out before diving his nose back in and getting his teeth on muscle and pulling-

 _BANG_.

His head snaps up, body tensing and still, and listens, eyes focused on the distance.

His ears swivel.

A mile off, maybe two. 

He drops his head back down to hurriedly finish his meal and then stands, taking off back through the thicket.

-

He carries his bag in his mouth and keeps heading North, then shifts East, not sure where he’s going and not really caring beyond the need to get _away_ -

 _Hot warmth and a moan_ -

Away from a few things. 

He keeps running, paws sinking in snow and nails digging before kicking snow up, eyes and ears alert. He’s run about five miles when he finds it, slowing to a stop near a tree thirty yards away.

The cabin smells warm, lit from the inside with an equally warm glow and smoke wafting out the stone chimney. He smells-

He scents the air.

Meat. Deer. Wood and embers and boiling water.

His mouth waters. He can’t remember the last time he was warm-

 _Neck stretched taut, exposing skin he wants to sink his **teeth** into, saliva building in his mouth_ -

 _ **BANG**_. 

He freezes, body tense and ears up, alert. He glances down briefly at the specks blown into the snow next to his left paw.

 _Click-click_.

“ _The fuck you doin’ on my land_ ,” the man demands, voice gruff and gun trained, both eyes open. 

_He doesn’t need to use the sight._

He stays stills, watching the man watch him, watching the man’s eyes dart down to his left leg and then almost as quickly back up.

He should run. Confrontation draws attention and he doesn’t want attention. He wants to be a ghost, be _gone_ , untraceable. You can’t be untraceable if someone knows where you are.

 _Click_.

“ _I said_ ,” the man starts, voice more of a _growl_ this time, “ _The fuck you doin’ on my land, **wolf**_.” The wind changes, another gentle, freezing breeze, but it’s enough for him to smell-

His eyes widen fractionally.

He drops the bag from his mouth and starts shifting, curling and hunching inwards while his bones _crack_ and realign, paws turning to fingers and metal whirring while it alters with his body-

He raises his head, bangs parting and crouched in the snow, and it’s strange, to see the man’s eyes widen and his mouth fall open a fraction.

“ _Shit_ ,” the man says, “ _Barnes?_ ”

His thoughts stutter.

 _Bucky_.


	10. I am the storm, so wait

“You just gonna stand there all night?”

His eyes snap back to the man’s, the man’s slanted to his left. They slide away from the arm and something in him shifts. 

He digs clothes out of his duffle and pulls them on, carrying his bag a few feet further into the room and then standing there, waiting. His instincts know even if it takes a second for his mind to catch up.

He is a guest, a visitor, an alpha in another alpha’s home. He can smell it like pine and hard, aged wood. He is a threat allowed to remain in this den.

The man sighs, slanting a look towards the fireplace before taking a seat in the chair the rifle is propped up against. “It’s not poison,” he says when the Soldier doesn't move, an invitation, permission to move.

Would it matter if it was poison?

 _Yes_ , a part of his brain whispers, the locks on thought fractured and the cage forced open.

He walks forward and ladles hot water (tea. He can smell the herbs and the finely crushed powder) into the spare mug on the brick. He looks towards the man and takes a sip, staying standing.

“I’m gathering from your unusual silence and your scent, that you’re here at _all_ , that you’re not quite how or _who_ you used to be,” the man observes, eyes raising to meet his over his mug.

He _does_ have a vague impression of the man-

 _Snarling teeth and strange claws_ -

-but nothing more.

The man looks down into his mug for a moment before setting it aside. “My name is Howlett. Logan Howlett,” he says, looking back up, “We fought in World War II together. Do you remember?” Howlett’s eyes narrow slightly and the Soldier keeps himself from reacting.

The museum said nothing about Howlett. Was he frozen too? Or was the exhibit not meant to have information on him?

Howlett’s eyebrows lower. “Does Cap know you’re alive?” Howlett scents the air and the Soldier stills. “He must know, the way you smell.” But he sounds more puzzled than anything. “He knows you’re alive,” Howlett says, voice straining a bit as he pushes himself up out of his chair, “But not that you’re here. He’d be busting through that door snarling if he knew.” 

The Soldier watches Howlett walk over to a bookshelf against the far wall and pull a book out, opening it and pulling something out from between the pages. He sets the book down and walks back over, offering the something out.

The Soldier glances down.

It’s a photo.

He takes it, careful of the old, brittle edges and holds it delicately between his fingertips. 

_Steve is smiling_ , is his first thought, the first thing his eyes are drawn to, and then they shift-

His face grins back, young and secretive but grinning, shadows from decades ago hidden away by the light mood, the victory caught in a moment, and it _was_ a victory-

_“We got all the supplies we’ll need for the next two months with all this,” he says, grinning sharp over at Steve._

_Steve smiles back, canines just a hint too long._

_“I’m more concerned about the booze,” Logan says, hands on his hips while he squints down at one of the boxes, soot still smeared across the bridge of his nose. Steve snorts a laugh._

_“Yeah, you and Dugan both,” Bucky quips back-_

Logan has an arm around Steve’s shoulder in the picture, Bucky’s around Steve’s other, Logan grinning feral and deep.

“You were younger then,” Howlett says, jolting him out of his thoughts, “Hell, even _I_ was, too.” The Soldier looks up at that. Maybe Logan _was_ frozen, too.

He sees it then, the same shadows in Howlett’s eyes, _more_.

“What the hell happened to you, kid?” Howlett asks.

 _I died_ , is his first thought, then: _ice_ , then-

“Hydra,” he finally answers, feels like he should give the photo back but can’t seem to get his fingers to let go of it. Logan’s face darkens.

“ _Hydra_ ,” he spits, “So they _are_ still around.” The Soldier stares down at him. “I’d heard things,” is all Logan says, turning and walking over to sit back in his chair and pick up his mug, “Bastards need to learn to _die_.”

“Don’t we?” he asks before he knows he’s asking, and Logan quirks a brow, lips slowly curving up with it.

“Point,” he agrees, taking a swallow of his tea. “Think I’m gonna need something stronger,” he says after a moment, pushing himself back up and heading towards the open kitchen, “Care to join?”

The Soldier stares after him for a few moments before following, photo still carefully held in hand.

\--

"Here you go,” she says, stepping aside, “All archived files from the start of the S.S.R. to S.H.I.E.L.D., up until computerization.”

“Thank you.” Steve replies with a smile. The agent’s heart rate increases as she blushes, scent warm and pleased. 

She nods back, closing the door behind her as she goes.

He _hasn't_ been able to track Bucky, just like Romanoff said. So, with trails cold or nonexistent, he's turned to paperwork. If the Winter Soldier goes back as far as the file suggests (and it has to because it's been _Bucky_ this _**whole time**_ ), then there might be something in the S.S.R.’s or S.H.I.E.L.D.’s older files from around the same dates in the Winter Soldier file. If not...Steve’s not sure what he should do next, and the idea of waiting is…

They've both waited long enough. Too long. Someone has probably tried this already, but maybe he'll see something they didn't. He _knows_ Bucky. 

Steve looks back to the filing cabinets and pulls the first one open.

\--

“When’s the last time you had something cooked?”

He pauses, cheeks puffed out with meat and bread dipped in stew, looking up at Howlett. He swallows. 

“Including coffee?” he asks roughly, subtly clearing his throat quietly. His newest handler liked it better when he spoke clearer.

Howlett raises an eyebrow, elbow resting on the table and tin tea mug in hand, this time not filled with tea.

“Two weeks, thirty-seven hours, twenty minutes,” the Soldier answers. Although, it had cooled by the time he had killed all of the Hydra agents in the house base.

Howlett stares at him for a moment before taking a swallow of his drink and gesturing towards the Soldier’s bowl and plate.

The Soldier digs back in, metal bottom of the plate scraping lightly against the wood table.

-

He’s directed to the far corner with the best view of the whole cabin, after, can see the short hall and all three doors. Howlett disappears into the room at the end of the short hall, then comes back out two minutes later with an armful of blankets and a single pillow, offering them over. 

The Soldier stares at them before slowly taking them.

“You try anything?” Howlett says, “I’ll know.” And part of him knows it should sound like a warning, but mostly it just sounds like fact. “And trust me,” Howlett continues, voice going lower with a hint of a laced in _growl_ , “You won’t win if we get into it. Understand?” 

He suppresses a shudder and nods. He doesn’t remember much about Howlett, but his body has always known better than his mind-

Has it? It sounds true ( _feels?_ ).

Howlett turns and heads back down the hall and he watches the door shut before turning to his corner. 

He sets the blankets and pillow down and curls up on the hardwood, left forearm under the side of his head and eyes on the room. 

He stares at everything, eyes checking the windows, the doors, shifting to the dying embers in the fireplace and the books and few knick knacks scattered on the bookshelf, listens to the wind and snow buffering up against the windows. He smells the smoke from the embers and ash from the fireplace and something _hot_ and _sweet_ -

He turns his head sharply and buries his nose in the floor, taking a deep breath of _wood_ and trying to drown it out, shove down memories of _wet heat_ and _moans_.

He rolls over onto his other side and then back again, holding in a frustrated growl. 

What good is he? If he can't even turn his back on an empty room.

-

He wakes with something hard between his legs and it takes him a few moments to figure out what it is. 

He freezes, listens for any sounds or noise or breathing in the living room and then turns his head and buries his face in the floor, breathing in deep. He closes his eyes firmly then squeezes them shut, taking another deep breath and thinking of nothing. The hardness slowly dissipates and he slowly relaxes from where he’d gone tense. 

Wood creaks and he sits up, eyes on the hall. Howlett steps out and glances at him before heading over to the kitchen. He doesn’t look surprised that the blankets and pillow were unused.

-

He taps a nail on the floor, barely there and light and quick. He could stop, but the... _freedom_ , out here in this cabin to do whatever he wants is difficult to resist, especially recently.

“Full moon’s comin’,” he hears, turning his head a little to look over at Howlett, tense. Howlett walks over to a tall cabinet and the Soldier stills, preparing for a fight. 

Howlett pulls out an ax and he goes tense all over again before Howlett tosses it to him. He catches it, staring between it and Howlett.

“Quit makin’ a face and go chop some wood,” Howlett says.

He blinks before getting up and heading for the door.

\--

Steve reads over the page, lips tugging down and eyebrows slowly pulling together. His stomach gives a low growl and he sighs, sitting back and squeezing his eyes shut briefly.

He bends back over and reaches for the next page, then pauses, eyes catching on a name.

‘ _Agent Peggy Carter leads Howling Commandos to retrieve artifact from Hydra Branch: Leviathan_.’

Her name’s been in a lot of these files.

He finishes looking down the page, flipping it over to the next one then setting it down, after.

That’s the last one for 1946.

He looks over all of the pages one more time before collecting them back in order and slipping them back into their file folder, setting it aside. He stares ahead for a minute before looking around the room.

Maybe he should just _ask_.

-

He keeps his pace sedate up the few stairs, doesn’t slow down like he wants and doesn’t speed up, either. His chest only starts to feel tight when he pulls the door open, handle gold and large and cold through his gloves. The tightness only gets worse when he stops at the front desk and asks the nurse if he can see her.

“Are you family?” the nurse asks, hardly glancing up from the paperwork scattered across her station.

“No,” he replies, and she reaches over to grab another sheet of paper.

“Then I’m afraid you’ll have to come back tomorrow.”

“Um,” Steve says, and she finally looks up for longer than a moment, eyes slowly widening.

“Oh! Oh, I’m sorry,” she lets out, pushing herself up and gesturing with an arm down the hall to his right, “Straight down there, turn left, then right, the room all the way at the end on the right,” she instructs.

“Thank you,” Steve replies with a small, tentative smile, and turns to follow her directions, shoving his hands deep down into his pockets after the first corner.

He passes a nurse in the hall when he picks it up: the scent of gunpowder and dirt under fingernails. 

He keeps walking, turning right and continuing on down the hall. 

Steve slows to a stop five feet from the door, staring at the afternoon light slanting across it from where the it's open a few inches. He takes a slow inhale and lets his eyes drift halfway shut while he takes in the scents.

 _Wood, illness, various fresh flowers and cleaning supplies, plastic and wires_ and... _aging,_ underlying it all, the smell of the softly dying. But mixed in with all that, and the strongest of all, if not as strong as in his patchy memory, is...fire and lipstick, elegant, lingering perfume and...something gentle, but strong and warm. 

_Peggy_ , Steve thinks, eyes opening from where they’ve fallen closed. He walks forward, gently pushing the door open and stepping inside.

“Oh,” he hears, eyes near instantly finding her, “Is it that time already-...Steve?” Her eyes widen and she lays still as a statue propped on her pillows, the top half of the bed angled up. 

_She’s more frail_ , he thinks first. 

Her hair still holds her curls from the blurry picture of her he has in his memory. It's odd, how looking at photos of her didn't clear it any, but looking at her now in person does, sharpens the blur of the image of her in his mind and makes it as clear as he's seeing her now.

“Is it really you?” she asks, voice shaky. That seems odd too, even if he can't remember enough to say for certain that he's never heard her voice shake. It feels true, anyway, and he's learned by now to try and trust that. 

Steve nods, slowly walking over to grab the chair in the corner, pausing. 

“May I?” he asks. She struggles to get up and he raises a hand, shaking his head. She stops and after a minute, nods. He drags the chair over, feeling her eyes on him the whole time. Steve slowly lowers himself down into it, trying not to shake like she is. 

He isn't feeling the same things, he can't, but he wants to tremble anyway (maybe partially less because his body is responding that way and more because he wants to give that to her).

“Steve…?” she asks, soft and...not frightened, something else. Shocked, maybe. He finally makes himself look at her again. 

“Do you...remember what Sharon said?” he asks hesitantly, “About me.” He knows she has days, minutes, hours where she doesn't remember, where she forgets all sorts of things. Agent Carter informed him not long after he woke up. It was part of why he didn't want to see her and part of why he did.

She shakes her head gently, watery eyes still roaming his face.

“I don’t…” he's going to stain his own damn memory, “I don’t remember everything from before, from my childhood to now.” Her eyes widen a little further and after a minute, she steels herself, takes hold of something she can focus on. That feels vaguely familiar. 

“You don't remember me,” she says, and he shakes his head. 

“No, not much,” he confirms, apologetic. Her eyes slip shut and then her lips curve up a little into a small, dry smile.

“What are the odds,” she says, soft and quiet and to herself. “Sharon told you about me, too,” she says, eyes opening again, “Is all this why you didn't come?” she asks, softer, “You _haven't_ come before, right?” He nods a little, glancing down, brow furrowing slightly. 

“I didn't want to ruin your memory of me. I'm sorry,” he apologizes. His eyes shift back up when a thin hand shifts towards him on the bed. He reaches out- 

Pauses. 

He pulls his glove off, taking her soft, thin hand in his smooth one. He's done enough damage already, and he doesn’t remember how much she knows. Doesn’t know if _she_ remembers how much she knows.

“Never,” she says softly, “In any form.” That makes him pause, right hand’s fingers curling a bit.

They sit like that for a while, Steve isn’t sure how long, but even without all of his memories he feels...peaceful, here, with her, like this.

“What is it you need, dear?” she finally asks, still soft. It should make him feel young, he thinks, but it doesn't sound like she's talking to a child, but to...whatever they were. Not quite lovers, not quite friends. 

Steve frowns a little, apologetic again. 

“I'm trying to find something important,” he starts, “But I can't find much of anything leading to it. What would the old me have done?” he feels stupid, asking it now and out loud. And sure enough, she smiles at him, patient and kind.

Steve blows out a breath, letting his head drop a little and his eyes shut while his lips curve up.

“Right,” he says quietly.

But…

He looks back up. 

“What if I would have done something then that I can’t remember that would help me now?” Her fingers curl around his gently, tightening in a soft squeeze. _She used to be strong_ , he thinks, _knows_ without knowing.

“Depends on what you were looking for,” she says, but her eyes grow darker. That makes him pause, too. 

He’s not sure what she knows and doesn’t anymore. Maybe she’ll never know anymore, either. 

“But,” she continues, eyes softening again, still shining in the light, “When you wanted to find something so badly it was like the Earth was grinding into dust beneath your steps, you went out there and searched everywhere until you found it, or someone found it. Either way,” she gives his hand another gentle squeeze, “You’ll find it, whatever it is.”

He stares at her for a long minute before nodding, then slowly bends forward, cupping her hand gently in his, her skin thin and translucent and so much older and stark compared to his unscarred skin and black glove.

“I should’ve come sooner,” he says after a while, almost a whisper, “I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry for the _world_ crumbling,” she teases softly, then adds, quieter, “The important thing is that you came.”

He ducks his head and rests his forehead against the top of her frail wrist, inhaling her scent. That woman of fire is still in there, under all the clutter of time and a new century, still burning strong and bright.

He wants to tell her what he's looking for, _who_ , but it doesn't feel like it's his to tell.

-

Steve stays with her until she sleeps, then quietly, carefully slips out the window next to the far wall, landing in a crouch in the bushes before slipping around the back and aiming for the sidewalk. 

He doesn’t feel eyes on him, thankfully, no smell of gunfire or dirt, and when he does pick up anything, it's not tinged with blood; it's tinged with electricity. 

“Romanoff,” he greets, as she steps into pace with him.

“How was your visit?” she asks, hands in her pockets and hood pulled up, elbow knocking gently into his.

“Cluttered,” he replies, eyes narrowing a little.

“She's safe,” she says, “But.”

“They're here,” he finishes for her, “They know.”

“Hunters,” she says, part thoughtful, part whimsical. “Guess it's a good thing you have a shadow isn't it,” she teases, smirk a little sharp.

She walks with him all the way to the Tower.


	11. Lovers, keep on the road you’re on. Soldiers, you’ve got to soldier on

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait, I know it's been a long while. I think I'm going to try and finish this story up first. I'm uploading two chapters, so keep an eye out for the second one.

The Soldier drops the last bundle of wood on the stack and pushes them into place against the cabin wall, huffing out a breath before heading back inside. The heat rushes out against his face as soon as he gets the door open, feels it burn every bit of exposed skin and turns, forces the front door shut against the wind and tries not to think of the tube, the ice. He wanders over to the corner he slept in and sits back against the wall, pulling a knee up.

Logan hasn’t moved from the fireplace, seems to be reading one of the few books from the bookshelf, head bent and eyes down. The Soldier takes the time to study him.

He is small in stature, shorter than the Soldier by several inches, but thicker, wider. Veins snake up his exposed forearms, disappearing into the flannel rolled against his inner elbows. His skin is smooth, but firm, and his features are rough, hair wild. He reminds the Soldier of an animal he can’t name, something just on the tip of his tongue but out of reach like all the rest, anything solid dangling just out of his grasp. It is...frustrating.

“You gonna keep starin’ all night?” Logan asks, his voice is as gruff as the rest of him.

“You’re not going to ask? Why I smell like him,” the Soldier replies.

“Don’t need to,” Logan says, the sound of the page turning loud in the cabin, “My nose works better than yours.” A statement. “How do you think I knew you were in my yard with the snow and wind blowin’?”

The Soldier is quiet for a minute, absorbing the words.

This man is dangerous.

After a minute, Logan asks, “Does Cap know? About Hydra.”

The Soldier considers this. “Unlikely,” he answers, because he can’t say for sure. The Soldier did not give up his handlers, and the Captain did not say their name.

“He should,” Logan says.

They fall into quiet after that, just the sounds of the wood crackling low in the fireplace filling the silence with their mingled breathing and steady heartbeats.

\-----

Steve does another lap, lets the vibration of his feet hitting pavement lull most of his thoughts into the background, ease him out of his head so he can think clearly.

He couldn’t find anything in the files when he’d gone back to look. Nothing. It’s not surprising, but he was hoping- He was hoping there’d be _something_ there, something he’d recognize. But there was nothing, just that the files go back as early as 1948, which had sent a chill down his spine. Whoever has had Bucky has been deploying him since three years after he fell from the train, _only three years_ , and had been deploying him until _recently_ , until Steve caught him, so much time Steve should have prevented-

He shakes his head a little.

The point is, there are no solid ties to the Winter Soldier in any of the SSR or S.H.I.E.L.D.’s files, not outside of...There’d been minor details in some reports, and just minor reports in general: an agent being found dead in their apartment here, someone recovering an unknown item before the SSR could get it there. Steve’s heart had leapt into his throat at the possibilities, but there was no concrete statement saying it had been the Winter Soldier, no proof ( _recorded proof, anyway_ ). There were so many of those more minor details and reports throughout the years, it was hard to say _any_ of them were Bucky, let alone all of them. Steve’s out of leads or ideas, like Romanoff had said he would be. Bucky’s a ghost, whoever had him is a ghost, and he doesn’t know what to-

“You’re running slow today.”

Steve’s head jerks up and swivels around, steps slowing as he locates the voice.

“Pardon?” he asks.

“Usually you leave me in the dust at least ten times before you’re done,” the man replies, lips tugging up, “You’re off your game today, man.”

Steve stutters to a stop, blinking. The man stops, too.

“I,” Steve says intelligently, ducking his head a little and rubbing the back of his neck. “That obvious, huh?” he asks, looking back up and subtly scenting the air. He can’t tell off the bat, but the man doesn’t smell like a Hunter. As far as Steve remembers their scents, anyway. So many things have changed, that could be one of them, too, especially with his memory being what it is.

The guy shrugs, chest heaving. Steve’s almost done with his own run; the guy must be close too.

He starts jogging and the man follows.

“We all have our off days,” the man says.

Steve dips his head in a nod, looking over at the long pond aimed up at the monument.

Him, Peggy, Bucky…

Steve huffs a humorless breath of a laugh before quickly reigning it in.

 _Everything’s a mess_.

“My name’s Sam Wilson.”

Steve jerks back out of his thoughts, blinking over and then offering his left hand. “Steve Rogers.”

The man grins and shakes it. It’s...his smile _looks_ honest. He doesn’t say anything about the gloves, either.

Steve ducks his head again. “Right,” he says, smiling self deprecatingly, “Probably obvious.”

“Just a little,” Sam replies.

Steve manages a small smile back, the first real one in a while. It feels like a start, but of what, he’s not sure. But between his life now, Bucky, whoever _had_ Bucky, the Hunters, Peggy...he’s not sure he wants to start anything else.

 _I need to find him_ , Steve thinks desperately, _Unless_ …

Unless staying away is safer, which hurts to think about, but maybe it will help keep Bucky alive, and the hunters and whoever had Bucky away.

\--

“ _Rogers!_ ”

Steve jerks the phone away from his ear, shaking his head a little to try and clear the remnants of sound still bouncing around his eardrums.

“ _You don’t call, you don’t write. I’m hurt. And after we lied to Fury together._ ”

 _Did more than that_ , Steve thinks wryly.

“ _I thought we had a **connection**_.”

“ _Tony_ ,” Steve sighs, tapping the phone volume down a couple more notches before warily bringing it back closer to his ear, “You’re still alive.”

“ _That’s one way to put it_ ,” Stark replies, “ _Pepper’s got me in the dog house_.”

“Pepper?” Steve asks, brows drawing together in thought before it clears, “Oh. Ms. Potts... _Oh._ Ms. _Potts,_ ” Steve adds after a moment, realization dawning like dark clouds filtering the sky. _Shit, Ms. Potts_. And he and Tony- “I’m such a _shi_ -”

“ _Nah, don’t worry about it_ ,” Tony cuts him off, sounds like he’s waving his hand. Steve can just barely pick up the sound of the air displacement through the phone. “ _She knows you’re on my list_.”

“List?” Steve asks, frowning towards his phone.

“ _Yeah. You know_ ,” Tony replies. No, Steve does not know. “ _The list of people you can sleep with and still keep your relationship in tact_.”

“ _Me?_ ” Steve asks, leaning back a bit.

“ _If the shoe fits_ ,” Tony replies, “ _Or the glove. The **down south** glove?_ ”

Steve can picture Tony’s eyebrows waggling and his expression evens out. “Tony.”

“ _Right, right. Anyway, not why I called. Come over. We need to talk_.”

The line goes dead and Steve pulls his phone away, frowning at it for a moment before surrendering with a sigh.

“Alright,” he says wryly to his empty apartment.

\--

“So. I did some digging,” Tony says, glancing back at him briefly, “What I could, anyway. It’s no wonder whoever it is managed to stay in the dark for so long. I didn’t find anything concrete, not even about whoever it is wanting _me_ dead.”

Steve’s fingers curl. “Nothing?”

“Concrete,” Tony emphasizes, throwing a few holoscreens up, “There’s some small things here and a few minor discrepancies there, but they’re more of a ghost than your werebuddy is.”

Steve doesn’t comment on that.

Tony pulls up two more screens of information and sits back. “Take a look for yourself,” he gestures.

Steve leans forward.

A few pieces of cargo missing, an officer found dead in his apartment, vaguely suspicious street activity. It’s like the files Steve had found from the SSR and S.H.I.E.L.D. Nothing conclusive, but minor things here and there that ping when you _know_ you’re looking for a decades old, secret organization. If you didn’t know what you were looking for, you wouldn’t see it.

“Point is, if we’re going to find them-” Tony starts.

“We might need to use Bucky as bait,” Steve makes himself finish, teeth gritting on the last, “Or you.”

“Yeah,” Tony sighs, looking back at him after a moment.

“That’s not the only problem,” Steve says.

Tony frowns.

Steve sighs, tense. “Hunters were in Margaret Carter’s retirement home. I smelt them. Probably looking for me. Which means they probably know who I am.”

Tony frowns further before sitting forward and typing. A holoscreen pulls up with security footage of the outside of the retirement home, the inside, of Steve walking in and out of the Tower. “I’ll have Jarvis run a facial detection program,” he explains as he types, “If anyone’s face shows up more than once in your’s or the home’s vicinity, he’ll flag it.”

“Thank you, Tony,” Steve says.

Tony sits back, stretching his arms up high over his head and popping something near his shoulder blade. “No problem,” he sighs as he relaxes, looking over again, “Drink?”

Steve smiles a little.

\-----

“ _Come on! Put your back and hips into it!_ ” Logan calls through cupped hands.

The Soldier grunts and slams the ax sideways, huffing fog into the cold air when it _thunks_ heavily into the tree trunk.

“ _Now less like you’re killin’ a man and more like you’re choppin’ a tree!_ ” Logan hollers, “ _Your brain might be shit but you **have** done this before!_”

The Soldier throws him a look and Logan just crosses his arms, waiting and watching.

 _Why can’t I just use my left arm_ , he thinks witheringly.

The Soldier repeats it with another grunt. Two more times and the tree comes down with a heavy _thud_ that echoes throughout the forest and shakes birds from their winter perches.

He looks over as he walks up to start chopping the tree to pieces and feels a tightness in his chest when Logan gives him a nod.

\--

In the day and half he’s been here, he comes to find he likes the way Logan moves. He doesn’t shrink away from taking up space, and the Soldier likes watching him move throughout the cabin with familiarity, a sense of belonging permeating every step, grab of an eating utensil, drop of a log into the crackling fire. Logan belongs in the cabin as much as the Soldier belongs with a gun.

What he also decides he equally does and doesn’t like is how straightforward Logan is, that he questions the Soldier with the bluntness of a handler, but none of the demeanor nor familiar line of questioning.

Like now.

“You don’t remember, do you.”

Well, less a question and more a statement.

The Soldier watches him steadily.

“You used to run your mouth off more,” Logan says before taking a drink, “You’ve changed. A lot. Not to mention that.” He nods his chin towards the left arm and the Soldier sees his sleeve shift with the soft whir of the panels out of the corner of his eye.

They don’t take their eyes off each other.

“You’re behaving like you’re sniping, but all the time,” Logan continues, watching him intently. He watches everything intently, the Soldier has noted. Logan sets his mug down with a quiet, impending _thunk_. “What did they do to that kid I used to know?”

It sounds like grief.

The Soldier slowly drops his eyes, finds his left hand, watches the light shift on his fingers as they curl and unfurl. He doesn’t know how to answer the question, isn’t entirely sure that he’s capable.

“I know his name is Steve,” he starts slowly after a minute, “I know my name is ‘Bucky’, but it doesn’t feel like mine.” He drags his eyes back up. “I don’t know ‘Bucky’, just the ice.” He doesn’t say that he doesn’t know Steve or Logan, either, doesn’t want to give Logan any more reason to displace him yet, though he has a feeling Logan already knows.

Logan watches him, brow furrowing.

The Soldier doesn’t know what he wants.

Eventually, Logan asks, “Do you want to remember?”

The Soldier blinks. “No one has asked me.”

“Well, I’m askin’, kid,” Logan says, eyes shrewd and honest. Honesty has always been easy to discern on a face ( _maybe because Hydra is full of liars?_ ). “Do you wanna remember?”

The Soldier thinks of Steve’s glowing blue eyes, of running through a forest with his mirror-

He blinks the image away, almost doesn’t want to chase it off. “I think so. Yes.”

Logan turns his mug on the table, watches it leave moisture on the old wood before picking it up and shooting back the remaining liquid, bringing the mug back down on with a decisive _thump_. “Then it’s decided.”

 _Just like that?_ The Soldier thinks.

Yes. That is his life now: decisions and choices. Adapt or die.

\-----

Steve shifts, turns, rolls onto his side and curls up a little more, feels heat all along his back, warm skin sliding against his, breath in his ear and teeth scraping up his skin. He shudders, huffs out a breath and arches back into, half turning to look-

“ _Captain Rogers_.”

He jolts awake, staring wide eyed up at the ceiling.

“Yes-” He clears his throat. “Yes, Jarvis?”

“ _The facial detection search results are available_ ,” Jarvis replies, “ _Mr. Stark is awaiting you in his lab_.”

“Right.” Steve blinks, pushes himself up. “Thanks.”

-

He glances around as he enters the lab, spots the three things Tony was working on the first time Steve was in here in what appears to be a discarded pile and redirects his gaze towards the sound of a heartbeat.

“Looks like _some_ one’s been following you,” Tony says out of the blue. Steve pauses briefly before joining him over where he’s leaning on his elbow on a workbench, staring at a screen. “Or multiple someones.” The screen splits into a fourway divide.

There is a man behind Steve in one, back twenty feet while another is across the street walking in the same direction. When Steve looks, the same men are in the same positions in both the D.C. and New York surveillance, and outside Peggy’s retirement home. They’ve been following him everywhere.

“They’re downwind,” Steve realizes.

“Yup,” Tony pops the ‘p’, “Staying clear of that dog nose of yours.”

Steve gives him a look but Tony’s leaning forward again to type. The screen flashes with a red ‘ _Not Found_ ’ and Tony frowns.

“According to this, they don’t exist,” he says, fingers already moving again. More ‘ _Not Found_ ’s pop up. “Nothing?” Tony asks, incredulous, “ _Impossible_ ,” he mutters to himself, hunching forward further.

“And they’re not S.H.I.E.D. or any other agency?” Steve asks, just to be sure.

“No,” Tony half-mumbles, distracted, “They can’t _not_ exist. Jarvis should’ve been able to find _something_. How did they erase their identities from the internet?” he finishes, voice getting quieter and quieter until even Steve can’t hear him.

He watches Tony work for a minute before slowly easing back. “Let me know if you find anything,” he says. Tony barely gives a grunt of acknowledgement and Steve turns to go, heading back into the elevator, sinking into thought in the silence as soon as the door is closed.

He’s being followed, maybe still. He was right, staying away from Bucky is for the best. Steve can’t lead them _to_ him.

He pulls his phone out after a moment and taps the fourth and final contact in his list, bringing it up to his ear. “Romanoff, I need to talk to you about something.”

\-----

The Soldier wakes to silence the next morning, the fire burnt down low to whispering embers in the hearth. Something woke him-

The front door creaks open and he sits up sharply, nose filling with cold and pine.

“Hey,” Logan says, half muffled as he pulls his shirt up over his head and tosses it aside, reaching down to undo his belt buckle, metal _clinking_ quietly. “Wanna go for a run?”

The Soldier blinks slowly but pushes himself up to stand, stripping out of his own clothes. Logan’s eyes linger on his left arm once cold air hits it. He can almost feel them trace the seam before landing on the star.

“ _Life is pain_ ,” Logan says low in Russian, shucking his pants off and kicking them aside.

“ _Pain is order_ ,” the Soldier replies automatically, then freezes, eyes widening fractionally.

"Nah, kid,” Logan says, “It’s just pain. Might help you focus, prove you’re alive, but there’s no order about it. It just is.”

The Soldier stares at him, fingers curled in the top of his jeans. “‘Prove I’m alive’?”

Logan steps forward and raises his fist-

The Soldier tenses but holds still. It’s just a firm, controlled punch to his bicep, hard enough to sting in the wake of Logan’s knuckles ( _harder than bone._ _Not bone?_ )

“You feel that?” Logan asks gruffly.

The Soldier nods, fingers twitching once against denim.

“You feel it, the pain. You’re here, you feel it, and you’re breathing. That’s life.” Logan steps away and the Soldier drops his eyes to the spot on his arm, lifting his hand to cover it.

It feels like dawn rising in the cavern of his rib cage. He’s not sure he likes it.

He pushes his pants down and off and follows Logan outside a moment later, out onto the cold, old wood of the porch that scratches rough under his feet, digging in briefly when he turns to close the front door behind him. Then out into the knee deep snow, breath fogging the air, a companion becoming quickly familiar. His breath. His life is doing that, existing, taking up space in the world.

 _Proof that he’s alive_.

The sound of bones snapping draws him out of his head and he starts to shift too, then they run, the Soldier shadowing Logan, smaller than him, bulkier, not the mirror in his head with glowing blue eyes.

\--

They run again the next morning and the Soldier finds himself relishing the snow between his paws, the cold wind combing through his fur, the sting of the promise of frost in the wet corners of his eyes. The way his body shudders with each pound of all four feet on the ground.

Hydra had given him a fifty-five foot length room and never let him run outside, never let him pound his feet into the snow, suck cold air between his sharp teeth.

He spreads his jaw wider.

It was never this, muzzle-free. Never free.

The Soldier slows to a stop as Logan does, ears swiveling while he scents the air, trying to find the cause. He spots it fifty yards off and stays still, watching, waiting. As soon as Logan’s body shifts, he moves, darting sleek and quick across the distance at Logan’s flank, breaking apart halfway to converge around, them coming at both sides-

His teeth sink into neck fur while Logan’s sink into the deer’s back leg, and he clamps _down_ to cut off its scream.

The Soldier drags the deer back through the forest while Logan’s tail brushes away their trails in the snow, disappearing their prints and turning them into ghosts. Maybe they have something in common, after all ( _besides photographed history_ ).

\--

“What was he like?” he asks while he washes the dishes in the sink - their dishes - scrubs away the traces of themselves like-

He jerks away from the thought.

“Barnes?” Logan asks.

The Soldier looks back over his shoulder.

Logan lifts his head from his book and leans back, drops the back of his head against the chair, eyes on the far wall.

The Soldier looks back forward, finishes the first plate and rinses it, sets it on the drying rack on the counter before reaching for the second, watching the water slosh gently and suck it in as it plunges into its soapy depths.

“He was a soldier,” Logan starts, and the Soldier keeps himself from pausing, thinks Logan’s addressing him for a second, “Kept shit to himself, put a on a smile for the world. Best sniper I ever knew, though, and that’s saying something.” A heavy sigh. “Loyal, especially to Cap. Steve. You’d give him plenty of shit, too, though, especially when he did something stupid and reckless. Almost always worked though, have to give him that.”

The Soldier thinks of his previous mission to kill Stark, of Rogers in the Tower, his eyes. He smells smoke and rinses off the second plate, reaches over to grab the first glass.

“He had his demons, but he was smart, wrote a lot in a journal he kept on him,” Logan continues, “Never got to see what. He’d tell some pretty great stories around the fire, though, so I thought maybe that’s what he was writing, among other things. Kid could dance, too. You and that Carter woman did it once, tryin’ to prove a point or somethin’, but it was a sight, especially in a war. Might’ve been why you were doin’ it at all. I never asked.”

Carter.

He blinks, rinses the second mug off and watches the water slide down its side to the towel on the counter before reaching down and unplugging the sink, watching the water swirl down the drain. He doesn’t remember finishing the first mug.

“You had something about you though,” Logan says, and the Soldier dries his hands off before he turns. Logan’s eyes drop over to him. “You were scared as shit, but you tucked it all up and put it away somewhere inside, were always focused when you needed to be, like-” Logan nods his chin at him. “Like that. Looks like Hydra took that part of you and spread it all over. You never felt the way you do now as much as you do now,” he finishes, studying him for a moment. “‘Pain is order’, huh,” he adds, not quite pointed but a nudge, a small shove.

The Soldier just watches him and Logan lowers his head a bit.

“It’s not hard to figure out at least some of what they did to you, not with those scars and that arm,” Logan continues. The Soldier holds still. Logan shakes his head, turning his eyes back forward. “I’ve been alive a long time, seen a lot of the bad shit, but what they did to you is one of the worst.” He looks back over and the Soldier finds it hard to maintain eye contact. He manages.

It’s quiet for a bit, enough to ease some of the tension. The Soldier wanders back over to his corner after Logan’s eyes drift back down to the fire, settling his back against the wall.

“You got a tracker in that thing?” Logan asks after a little while. The Soldier follows his eyes to his left arm.

“I removed it,” the Soldier replies. Barnes? Should he think of himself as Barnes? It belongs to his body, just as Asset and the Soldier do.

“No other ones you might not know about?” Logan presses.

“No,” he replies, “Sedation rarely proved effective. I was awake.”

Logan’s eyes drop to the fire again and he nods, doesn’t say anything more.

\--

He wakes to clothes sitting in a small pile ten feet away in front of him and the smell of meat, finds food waiting and kept warm in the oven and the cabin empty. The Soldier slips into the bathroom to shower quick and efficiently then eats, the front door creaking open halfway through. He turns, notes the bag on Logan’s arm and the smell of...people, unknown people.

Logan glances from him, down to the bag, and back up again, closing the door behind him.

“Even I want toothpaste and soaps now and then,” he comments, setting the bag on the counter and pulling something out, tossing it at him. The Soldier catches it reflexively, looking down at the bag of razors. “Besides,” Logan adds, “Pretty sure you don’t want to try shaving with your claws. It’s not fun.”

The Soldier...Barnes? Looks back down at the razors, turning the bag over.

“If you wanna shave,” Logan adds, disappearing down the hall with the bag.

The Soldier...Barnes, reaches up and rubs his fingers along his jaw, feels the rough prickle of overgrown hair. His handlers had always kept him groomed.

He looks back down at the razors.

‘Bucky’ had been clean shaven in all of the pictures in the museum, the one from the bookshelf, more than the Soldier has ever been.

“You can borrow a pair of clothes until you get your own,” Logan says as he comes back in.

“Your clothes won’t fit,” he replies.

Logan just shrugs. “They’re used to being stretched out.”

\--

“You haven’t called me a name since I arrived,” he comments.

Logan flips a page. “Why? You want me to?”

It’s quiet.

They spend a lot of time that way. He prefers it. Hydra was always making noise: machines beeping, fingers hitting keys, turning buttons, pens scratching over paper, tapping on clipboards, words exchanged, ordered, demanded. Even their blood and heartbeats were loud, always quick, very few steady or slowed.

But here, all there is is Logan’s rhythmic, heavy, metric _thuds_ pumping in his chest, throughout his veins and the sound of his own, and sometimes the wind buffering the wooded walls and windows outside. There’s more space in his head with less noise rushing in to constantly fill the gaps.

“‘Barnes’?” he tries to say, but his voice lilts up on the end and turns it into a question without his say. Logan knew his body when it was Bucky, knows Bucky more than the Asset does, even with memories or something akin to starting to surface. It feels like he should ask someone who knew him.

“I can do that,” Logan replies.

No resistance, no questions. It’s a...relief, to not feel like he’s one word away from Correction, from the chair. Logan has not asked him many questions or made any demands since the Asset arrived, nor made use of his skills save for hunting.

He looks down at his hands. “I still don’t feel like Bucky.”

“Barnes is a good compromise,” Logan replies, finally looking up, “What did they call you? Hydra.”

“‘The Asset’,“ he answers, “‘The Soldier’. ‘Fist of Hydra’.”

Logan’s expression darkens and his huff of a laugh is sour. “If they knew who you were, that entire program was one long, sick joke.”

The Soldier frowns in question.

“Cap’s right hand turned into a Nazi organization’s ‘fist’,” Logan clarifies with a sneer aimed at a wall, “I bet they had a good laugh.”

It’s silent save for the fire crackling.

Logan snaps his book shut and sets it aside, pushing himself up. “Time to make dinner.”

The Asset watches him.

“ _Up, Barnes_ ,” Logan snaps out.

He jerks to standing.

Barnes.

\-----

“I’ll look into the two men.”

“Agent Romanoff-” Steve starts, but reflexively jerks his jaw shut with a snap at the eyebrowed look she levels him. It feels like someone used to give him that look before, and he learned from it.

“Listen, Rogers,” she starts, all business again, “You might be pushing ninety, but I have been at this longer. I know how to blend in in ways you don’t; that’s my job. And besides, it’s hard enough to track me if you’re a werewolf. They’re not, right?”

“But they still _track_ werewolves-” he tries.

“I’m not full wolf,” she cuts him off again, lips curling, “Nor am I untrained. I can handle it and myself. Just go about your days like you have been and let me do my job.”

Steve can’t do much but stare at her helplessly as she moves for the door, opening it.

“Besides,” she adds, throwing a smirk over her shoulder, teeth extra sharp and eyes glowing cyan, “What makes you think I hadn’t already noticed them?”

She goes and Steve stares after her, speechless.

They might not be friends, but he’s suddenly glad that they seem to be on the same team.

\--

“Never have I ever lost my virginity.”

They both take a shot.

“You know alcohol doesn’t affect me, right?” Steve asks.

Tony levels him a look somewhere between _bored_ and _unimpressed_. “Take your turn, Rogers.”

Steve draws out a _mmm_ , eyes rolling up in thought. “Never have I ever...been in love.”

Tony scoffs. “Weak.” But they both take a shot, Tony wincing a little at the taste.

“Let me guess, your first time was romantic,” Tony drawls, pouring them both another drink. He’s been progressively leaning more and more on his elbow on the counter, Steve’s noticed. “Wait, you probably would’ve done something _sappy_ like: ‘ _Never have I ever made love under the stars_ ’,” Tony quips.

Neither of them take a shot.

Tony’s eyes slowly widen as he stares. “Oh God please tell me I wasn’t your first I’m a _terrible_ first-”

Steve waves it off and Tony all but collapses on the counter with a huge, relieved sigh.

“America would never forgive me,” he bemoans, “I’m taking a shot just for that near miss.” He throws it back, downing it in one go and _thumping_ the glass back onto the marble counter, reaching for the bottle again to refill it.

Tony stares at its label for a moment before he stills and Steve freezes, dreadfully watches Tony’s eyes slant back up to him, a little wide.

“Never have I ever lost my virginity to James Buchanan Barnes.”

Steve cringes, hunching in on himself a bit as he slowly brings his glass to his lips and tilts it back, swallows it all down.

“Not surprising,” Tony comments, and Steve frowns, “But you’re suspiciously hunkering down on yourself so maybe it’s not that it happened but _when_ it happe-”

“ _OKAY_ , that’s enough,” Steve declares, ears warm, swiping the bottle up and turning, leaning back on his stool to set it on the other side of the counter, far out of Tony’s easy reach.

“-which means it probably happened recently- _What the hell_ , Rogers? When could it have happened _recently?_ ” Tony demands, eyes still drunkenly fixated on him.

“Um,” Steve says, eyes everywhere but him. He sighs. Might as well. “He may have shown up at my apartment after I got back and S.H.I.E.L.D. took us in while I was...in heat.”

Tony stares at him and Steve ducks his head a little, ears growing hotter. Tony throws his drink back, slamming his glass back down on the counter after and pointing at him a little crookedly. He grins slowly. “Rogers, you _dog_.”

Steve ducks further before forcing himself up. “Tony, _please_.”

Tony sobers a bit, dropping his hand to the counter.

Steve drops his eyes to the counter, too. “He doesn’t...we shouldn’t have done it.” He doesn’t look up to see the confusion he can feel coming from Tony, the concern he catches a whiff of amidst the Vodka.

“Why not?” Tony asks, and Steve keeps his eyes down, traces the grooves of black rock jagged in the marble, “You haven’t seen the guy in over seventy years. What’s a little reunion sex?”

Steve’s quiet for a minute, can feel it building and building in his chest until he finally blurts, “He doesn’t _know_.” It’s silent for a heavy beat. “He didn’t…” Steve makes himself continue, clearing his throat quietly and lowering his voice, “He didn’t know that I...He still might not.”

It’s silent.

A hand waves into his vision.

“Bring that bottle back over here,” Tony slurs just a little, “It’s not my preference but Romanoff left it so it’s free, and you could use another drink.”

Steve reaches back after a moment and brings it over, setting it back down in front of them. Tony takes it and pours them both another drink, pushing Steve’s glass towards him with his fingers.

“Drink,” he orders, and Steve sighs again, but obeys, tilting his head back. “What’s the point in living this long if you can’t even be _happy_ in the end,” Tony grouses.

“Tony, it’s barely been a month,” Steve replies.

“For _you_ ,” Tony says, and that makes Steve look up, “But what about _him?_ ”

That makes Steve pause.

He thinks of the metal arm, of Bucky’s memory loss, the way he’d acted.

Steve grabs the bottle and downs the rest of it.

He hadn’t really let himself consider it- that time had passed slower for Bucky, more horrific for Bucky.

“Yeah,” Tony says quietly, and suddenly, Steve wishes with a fervor he hasn’t felt since right after Bucky fell from the train that he could get drunk.

\--

Steve rolls onto one side, then after a moment back onto the other, curling up further on the bed, hand tucking up under his pillow. He rolls back onto his other side after a minute, sighing and opening his eyes.

He stares across at the wall, then after another two minutes, rolls over and stares out across the room, larger than the one in his apartment but just as empty.

He can’t get Bucky out of his head, and after another minute, he stops trying. Steve resigns himself to another sleepless night and hopes that wherever Bucky is, he’s safe.


	12. Once upon another time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you Kay (Stringlish) for betaing, and just being plain supportive. <3

“ _So. These mysterious ‘hunters’. Tell me more about them_.”

Steve frowns a little at his phone. “They’re not mysterious,” he replies, turning his bathroom light off and heading for the kitchen, “They’re simple. They’re highly skilled trappers who hate werewolves. That’s all they are.” He pulls his fridge door open with maybe a little too much force.

“ _Are you trying to convince you, or me?_ ” Natasha teases from down the line, a smirk in her voice.

Steve grits his elongated teeth, forces the tension to a distance and feels them shorten. “They don’t care,” he says quietly, almost a whisper, eyes dropping to the bottom of the fridge and eighty years ago, “We can love, have families and friends and...they don’t care.”

They didn’t care that his mother was a good person with an only son who spent most of her life trying to help people as a nurse and raise that only son practically on her own. They didn’t care about him, either. And they didn’t care about Bucky.

He bends down and pulls out the makings of a sandwich, bumping the fridge door closed with his hip, phone tucked between his shoulder and ear. “Just be careful,” he says, “Please.”

Natasha gives an assent and hangs up, and Steve tries to get through his day without putting his frustration and helplessness into his fists and through a wall.

\-----

He skids to a stop, kicking up a flurry of snow, panting breaths fogging the air. He catches sight of the deer again and takes off, aiming his jaws for its back leg and steadily closing the distance, teeth baring in a facsimile grin-

-

He drags the deer around back through the snow, unclenching his jaws to drop it every so often to trot back the way he came and use his tail to brush over his paw trail, distorting it. The deer’s practically frozen when he goes to sink his teeth into the back leg again, blood cooled and coating his tongue and gums and lips, but it’s got enough meat on it for the two of them.

He drops it again at the cabin and shifts, bones cracking. The back door _bangs_ open and he whips his head around, grunting as his muzzle retreats back into his face.

“Nice buck, Buck,” Logan smirks from the top of the porch.

Barnes scowls, pushing himself up and treading naked over the snow. He bends and grabs the bitten hind leg of the deer and drags the whole thing over to the shed, pulling the screeching door open. Birds skitter high out of the trees, more snow lightly dusting the ground in their wake.

“I had to go twenty miles out,” he replies, hauling the deer up to string it up to the shed roof just beyond the door frame. He lengthens his left fingers together into a clawed point and slashes down the length of the deer, lower abdomen to the bottom of the throat to the sound of footsteps crunching closer behind him through the snow. He wrinkles his nose at the wave of warm scent wafting up from its insides, watches the intestines spill out and steam rise from gape and pile and tries not to think.

“Why can’t we just eat it raw?” he asks, licking the cold blood from the corner of his mouth and gums before raising his hand to do the same with the warm blood on it. It’s been a week, longer than he should’ve let himself stay, and while he’s come to...enjoy the warm food, making it, he’s learned, is a _hassle_.

“Because I want to save some for later, kid.”

He scowls at that moniker, too.

“Now quit scowlin’ and get to work,” Logan orders, steps retreating, “Dinner ain’t gonna make itself, and it’s your kill.”

 _Sir, yessir_ , he thinks, then pauses to think that thought over.

\--

He waits until Logan has finished shifting. They share a stare before taking off through the snow.

Logan’s form is bulking and short and rough, and he shoots straight ahead like an arrow, a sword aimed for the center of a throat, or a boulder ready to bulldoze over everything in its path. Barnes starts weaving around trees, relishes the snow and earth beneath his paws, the smell of it all, cold and harsh in his nose, and when he glances over again, he sees a blonde wolf instead of dark brown and almost hits a tree.

The illusion sheds itself and resolves into Logan watching him, studying. He does that sometimes, and doesn’t seem to care if Barnes catches him doing it. That’s one thing the Soldier finds he likes about Logan; Logan is aware he is a weapon, is straightforward, but also treats him like he is _more_ than a weapon.

Like-

\--

A crow lands nearby, not close enough to pounce on, but close enough to share space with, and rolls around in the snow, quirking its head at him every time it stops. Barnes mimics it and they- play, ruining the perfect white while Logan wanders the clearing.

\--

They’re sprinting up a mountainside in the morning, darting through drifting fog when they get whiff of it and both of them skid to a stop, heads whipping up and around to follow the scent.

Strangers.

( _And when did **he** become something other than a stranger?_ )

Logan takes off first and Barnes follows full tilt, anxiety and fear and anger in his chest. Maybe he should just go, switch directions completely. He’s only brought trouble following his heels-

They skid to a stop five miles down. He can hear their steps crunching slow in the snow, whoever they are, an attempt at stealth. They hide behind the trees, out of sight. There’s roughly ten of them by the sounds of it. They must be Hydra, or S.H.I.E.L.D. _They must be_.

Either way, he’s learned that Logan doesn’t like _anyone_ on his mountain except the local wildlife.

He finally catches their scent and wants to bolt ( _not Hydra. Who? Gunpowdergunpowderfearanger_ ), but before he knows it, Logan’s teeth are bared and Barnes takes one glance around before charging into the nearest agent, and everyone _moves_.

He gets clipped in the shoulder and thigh, the left arm repelling bullets like rain off a tin roof. His mouth fills with so much blood he wants to gag, feels it pour out of his jaws like he’s a stone lion fountain poised in front of ancient stone steps. It doesn’t taste like the deer did. It’s saltier, thinner, bitter.

It’s a violent mess of guns and teeth, men screaming and wolves growling low and deep and guttural. Blood sprays on snow, mixes with the smell of _winter_ and _forest_ and _gunpowdergunpowderfearanger_ and he tries not to think, doesn’t have the time to do more than react and follow muscle memory.

When they’re all dead and still, he pants into the stillness of the wilderness, as unmoving as the forest and the snow between his paws. The cracking of bones jerks his eyes over to Logan shifting and he moves to do the same.

“Hunters, by the taste of them.” Logan spits out blood and then bends down to shove his face into the snow, hands planted on the ground. He sits up and spits out another mouthful.

Hunters?

The word sends a chill down his spine.

“I should leave,” Barnes says. Logan surveys the bodies.

“Might be time to, kid,” he replies, and sighs before pushing himself up to his feet.

Barnes helps him with the bodies.

\--

They both pack.

“M’gonna miss this place,” Logan says.

Barnes drops his head a bit. “I’m sorry.”

“Eh, it’s just for a while,” Logan replies, clapping a heavy hand on his shoulder. Barnes wobbles slightly with it. “You got somewhere you could go,” Logan adds, raising a meaningful eyebrow.

Barnes doesn’t say anything to that, and Logan doesn’t say anything more about it.

They go their separate ways with no fanfare. Something in Barnes makes him surge forward before they do, arms wrapping around Logan, fingertips barely meeting around his thick back. Logan’s stiff for a moment before wrapping an arm around him, patting him twice before letting him go.

“Take care of yourself, kid,” he says, and Barnes nods.

“You, too.”

\--

He readjusts his duffel strap an hour and a half later, watching the ground. The snow thickens and thins, mounds of white on a road to nowhere. He picks up the sound of a truck, tires bumpy on gravel, jostling its metal weight, but keeps his gaze down. It slows as it nears and that draws his eyes up, nails sharpening, ready.

It rolls to a stop on his left and the passenger window rolls down.

His eyes widen slightly.

“Need a lift, Soldier?” a red haired woman asks. She’s not smiling, but it feels like she is, and her bare scent-

It’s not her scent. Few things are familiar, even fewer are good, but that-

Her eyes slant sharp to the back window and he hears it: more trucks.

“We don’t have much time,” she says, looking back to him, “Rogers doesn’t know I’m here.”

He opens the passenger door and climbs in.

-

He watches the ground. The snow thickens and thins, passing quickly underneath the front of the rusted hood. He squishes the inner sides of his boots firmer against the ends of his duffel between them. Despite the warmth in the cab, her scent is not stifling. It’s even...barely there beneath the familiar one. It’s almost undetectable, like it’s not really there at all.

“No questions?” she asks after a short while, “I’m surprised you got in with just a name drop.”

“No you’re not,” he replies, “Yours isn’t the scent I smell.”

Rogers’ scent, on top of her words. It was a risk getting in the vehicle, but-

“You don’t have many options,” she surmises, “But I do know Rogers. He’d have my head if Hydra caught you while I was here. He wants to find you himself.”

“He did that once before.” He’s not sure what makes him say it, but the words taste wrong on his tongue. Rogers has come for him more than once. It warms some part of him, but the rest doesn’t know how to feel. Better Steve Rogers than Hydra, maybe. “Where are you taking me?”

“Do you want to see Rogers?” she returns.

He pauses.

“Then we’re going to a safe house three states from here,” she says.

He glances out the passenger window.

One safe house for another. That’s three now in this decade. For the first time, the Soldier, Barnes, contemplates home.

-

The house is more modern than Logan’s had been when they finally reach it, two stories tall, more vertical like the trees it’s nestled between than wide, large windows scattered throughout.

Logan...He hasn’t felt worry for another in a long, long time. But Logan’s a survivor. He can take care of himself.

“You can pick your room,” she says- Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow, she’d introduced herself as in the truck, “I’m only staying three days.”

He glances around once he’s inside, scents the air. It’s stale yet new. If he is to trust it, she’s never stayed here for even that long before. He should try and do the same, this time. He’d let himself get too comfortable at Logan’s.

His eyes finally land on the stairs and he takes them up. They don’t creak under his weight and boots.

There’s four rooms in all, three up and one down. He takes the upstairs one with windows in the far East corner, facing away from the way they came. He should take the one on the first floor, but from up here, he can _see_ ( _and something in him wants to be in a high place, something old_ ).

He hears her footsteps and heartbeat stop in the far West room. The upstairs floor doesn’t creak under his boots when he checks the whole room for bugs and surveillance, either, or when he drops his duffel on the floor next to the mattress.

It’s a simple setup: one mattress with one blanket and pillow folded on top of it on the floor, one dresser, one closet, one bathroom in the middle of the intersecting halls at the top of the stairs. The kitchen downstairs is bare of everything but a coffeemaker and two mugs, three plates, two sets of utensils, soap, and frozen food in the freezer. The washer and dryer have large circle windows in their centers, look modern and new and have barely been used. When he checks, there is no internet or wireless signal, or a phone, and there are no bugs or listening devices that he can find. It is clean and isolated.

Parts of him feel satisfied, but it is not the same as ‘safe’. He’s never considered the feeling before, but he’d felt closest to it with Logan.

“I’m taking first shower,” she announces. He drags his eyes from the windows over to her. “Try anything and I’ll stab you,” her retreating back warns. It sounds like there’s a smile in the words.

He shakes his head a little to displace the familiarity. He doesn’t know her.

He watches for a moment after her back disappears before looking back out the windows. He wants to cover them, but he can’t stop looking out at the forest.

\-----

Steve pushes his way into Fury’s office, making a beeline for his desk. “Where’s Romanoff?” he asks. God, even his voice sounds tired. He resists clearing it. It’s been a long week since she left to investigate and he- he hasn’t heard from her since.

Fury leans back in his chair, steepling his fingers. “She’s pursuing a lead.”

“On Bucky?” Steve leaps.

Fury doesn’t say anything and Steve feels like he’s going to jump out of his skin any minute, maybe catch on fire while he’s at it. His eyes feel like they’re burning in their sockets from all the sleep he’s not getting.

“She confirmed that you’re being followed,” Fury replies instead, “You’ve kept to your normal routine?”

Steve tries to wrangle his hope down and forces a nod.

“Good,” Fury replies, “I’ve tripled your security, have you noticed?”

That makes Steve pause. He shakes his head.

“Good,” Fury repeats, “Now we just need to wait.”

“You’re using me as bait,” Steve almost sighs. He shouldn’t be surprised. He’s _not_ wholly surprised. “What about missions?”

“We’ll keep everything as it has been so nothing seems out of the ordinary,” Fury answers, “As for Romanoff,” he continues when Steve opens his mouth, “She checked in an hour ago and is tracking a lead.”

He doesn’t say anything more, and after a minute, Steve forces himself to turn and leave the office, heading for the elevator. He stops almost at the end of the hall when he catches a whiff of...something, gunpowder and oil mixed with some underlying scent he can’t…

He turns his head left and right, scanning the halls, but there’s no one, so after a moment, he turns and heads over, presses the button for the elevator.

\-----

Barnes drops his head when the hot water’s finished soaking through his hair, letting out a breath when the heat slithers down his aching spine. It feels...good. He still can’t remember much, but none of it had felt good.

 

 _His cock slides up between cheeks once, gets coated in something warm and slick, something that smells sweet and **good** and then he slides it back down and starts pushing in, the body below his, Steve, **omega** arching back against him_ -

 

He cracks his eyes open. His hand slides slowly down his skin, over the dips and raises of scars and muscle, down the flat plane of his lower stomach, down further to palm his cock, eyes drooping closed while his mouth sags open slightly.

Maybe some recent things have felt good.

He shouldn’t be thinking about it.

His fingers wrap around himself-

He shouldn’t.

\- give a slow stroke-

He holds in and swallows down a sound, biting his lower lip roughly.

Fuck.

He leans harder on his left hand on the tile wall.

 

 _He noses up under the omega’s ear, inhales his scent while he thrusts his hips, shudders faintly at the feel of the slide. He’s so **hot** inside_ -

 

His forehead _thunks_ quietly next to his hand, cool tile sending a slight chill down his body.

 _Fuck_.

 _She’ll smell it_ , he thinks a little dizzily, the thought sudden but faint under the weighted haze occupying his mind, _She’ll smell what I do in here_. She might not be exactly what he is, but he knows she’s _something_ , something that can tell that much, at least.

His hand strokes again and he grits his teeth.

 _Maybe I’ll do it anyway_ , he thinks, defiant. The freedom of the choice makes him dizzy.

\--

He doesn’t bother with the fan, after. She’ll hear it, know he’s done something even if she can’t smell it in the end. He dresses and wanders downstairs, hair wet and slick against the sides of his neck, shirt collar damp where it buffers his skin, and keeps his steps silent.

She’s lounging on the couch just around the corner, strategically positioned, gives him a brief glance before going back to a book from- somewhere. He doesn’t bother reading the title.

She still smells very faintly of Steve. He’s not sure how he knows, just that he can detect it, bare traces that it is. He focuses his thoughts so his body doesn’t react the way it wants to in response and heads for the kitchen.

“You still smell like snow and pine,” she comments softly.

“You smell like nothing,” he replies. There’s still enough coffee left for one in the coffeemaker. He leans a little closer to take a whiff and then steps back, heading for the living room. There’s some drugs and poisons that don’t have scents, so he’s not going to bother.

“I smell like Steve,” she says almost coyly, a smile in her voice. Instinctually, his hackles rise a little and he forces himself calm.

“Why are you doing this? Helping me,” he asks. He might have been able to wait this out at some point, play along, but he’s tired of the bullshit. He’s tired of a lot of things.

“The human answer? Rogers wants you safe,” she replies, turning a page in her book, “The alternate answer: I need you alive to find out what you know, and to find out who’s been tracking you and what they know, and want.”

Even if both of those answers are true, they’re not the whole truth. She smiles like a secret; there’s more to this than she’s saying.

He decides to leave it for now and head back upstairs.

Later, he catches a hint of that bare scent again, Steve’s, the one that makes his insides tinge warm. He hears her soft steps trail off towards the other end of the house and settles in the knowledge that he knows her position for now, and slips into a silently fitful sleep.

\-----

Steve sucks in a breath as he wakes, panting and staring up at the ceiling, shudders a little at remembered images of skin on skin, of the feeling of _hot breath_ and _teeth_ and-

He slides a hand down his sweaty face, hesitates a moment before sliding it lower, down and across his chest, pinches a nipple through his t-shirt and sucks in another breath, letting his eyes slide closed while sliding his free hand slowly down his stomach. He tugs the end of his shirt up to feel his warm skin, dips his fingers down beneath the edge of his boxers and spreads his legs, the sound of the sheets rustling loud in his ears as he wraps his hand around the hard heat between his thighs.

He strokes himself once, huffing out a soft groan, does it again while his teeth sink into his lower lip.

He’s had a hard time not touching himself since- since Bucky. What’s mostly stayed his hand is the guilt. He shouldn’t think of Bucky that way, shouldn’t have done what he _did_ with Bucky. He hasn’t wanted to touch himself since before the war, from what he can remember, not even after he woke up in the future, not since he and Bucky- Sex was the furthest thing from his mind, wasn’t even _in_ his mind, until…

He strokes his cock to memories of Bucky’s hot breath on his skin, of his teeth digging a little into his shoulder, slides his other hand across his chest and rolls a nipple to the memory of Bucky’s body sliding against his side. He arches his back like he had against Bucky’s while pressing and rubbing his thumb against the slit and-

He lets go of his nipple and comes with a groan muffled into his wrist while he rubs his fingers between his cheeks where _Bucky_ had been, eyebrows screwed up. He goes limp on the bed after the shockwaves start to ebb and pants, sliding his hand out of his boxers and ignoring the sticky-wet mess.

He gradually, slowly peels his eyes open and stares a little fuzzily up at the ceiling, trying to catch his breath.

It’s wrong like this, but Steve misses Bucky, and he misses whoever Bucky’s become.

\-----

Barnes wakes the next morning and keeps his eyes closed for a moment while he listens, absorbs the surrounding smells. There’s movement downstairs, the softest _clinking_ of metal on thick glass. Romanoff in the kitchen, maybe.

He opens his eyes and slowly sits up, stands on the bed then slips out into the hall, silently down the stairs.

She’s standing at the counter, stirring something in a mug. It smells like...tea, maybe. Something rosey.

“I could kill you with this spoon,” she says, quiet and light, pulling it out and tapping lightly, twice against the rim of the mug before taking a sip, eyes closing. He watches the steam pour up and frame her face, ghost across the red of her hair to dance with shadows as it dissipates on its way to the ceiling.

“You’re not the only one,” he replies evenly, heading over to the freezer.

“No,” she agrees, lips quirking, “I could kill everyone with it.” She sets the spoon in the sink while he tries to parse that out.

She made a...joke?

He glances at the spoon. All traces of this will be gone by morning.

He looks back to the food selection in the freezer. Can he trust her enough to eat any of it?

“Wanna have a powow about Rogers?” she asks after another sip.

He tenses.

“Relax a little,” she continues, easy as anything, “I barely know the guy, but I probably know more about him than you do, even with your extended exposure.” A smile in her voice.

His hackles rise again and he watches her out of the corner of his eye, letting the freezer door fall shut.

“I know his favorite color’s you,” she teases over the lip of her mug, green eyes pinpoints in the red framed around her face.

He’s not used to...teasing. Logan rarely teased.

He turns to head back upstairs, stomach dissatisfied. It will have to wait, and make do with some of the leftovers Logan gave him.

“Do you know what ‘hunters’ are?” she asks.

 

 _Redascreamredredred_ -

 

He stops. He blinks and the red fades, the room slowly coming back into focus.

“No,” he answers.

He can feel her eyes studying him, looking for cracks he’s not sure he even has.

“Rogers says they’re werewolf hunters that have been tracking and killing for decades,” she starts. He tenses slightly. “He’s had two men tailing him around D.C. and New York. He thinks they’re hunters. I’m not sure that’s what they are, but it’s true he’s being followed.” A pause. “This bothers you.”

He slowly forces his fingers to uncurl. He hadn’t realized they’d curled.

“Steve is in danger,” he states, knows it down keep in his bones, somehow.

“So are you,” she returns, “Me too, if they find out.” So she is a werewolf of some kind. “What will you do?”

He looks over and watches her for a moment, drops his eyes to his hands, the floor, then eventually back up. “He is in danger,” is all he can say, helpless for the first time since his freedom. He hates it.

“Guess you’re coming with me,” she says, quirking a brow, “Maybe. I still have a job to do, and it wasn’t you. Care to help?”

He inclines his head in question.

“I need to track down whoever sent the people following Steve,” she answers.

That makes him pause.

“I want in,” he decides.

Her smile curls her lips up and reminds him of the cat who got the bird.

He doesn’t trust her, he can’t, and he knows she doesn’t trust him, but maybe they can work together long enough to get Steve out of danger.


	13. It's dark, it's cold

Her voice mingles with the radio, carefree as could be, up, down, light and soft. Barnes lets it fill the background in his head, drifting thoughts strung throughout the strings of notes like small town lights dotting the nightscape horizon. When her voice eventually trails off, he waits and dreads a question.

“How much do you remember?”

He’s been expecting that one.

He chooses not to answer. It’s a relief to have that choice, that freedom, though his body still tenses fractionally, waiting for punishment or the hidden motive to make itself known.

“What’s your favorite color? You never answered,” she says next, lips curling up, undeterred, “Since you’re Steve’s, that would make yours...blue, am I right?”

He keeps his silence, staring out the passenger window, and doesn’t tell her that she is.

“You two are cute,” she says. 

He tries not to think of how it warms him, to have something in relation to Steve in the eyes of another. It doesn’t matter, it shouldn’t matter, but he feels anyway.

The drive is quiet. He asks her where they’re going, finds out it’s a small town just south of the Canadian border, above North Dakota, and leans back further in his seat.

“You’re tracking the hunters there?” he asks.

“So far,” she replies, flicking the turn signal on for the first time in an hour and a half, the rhythmic _click_ loud in the truck cab.

“How are you tracking them?”

“Tracked down the men following Rogers. They weren’t willing to talk, even with some persuasion, but I found one of their journals half burnt in a kitchen sink. It’s a longshot, but worth a look, don’t you think?”

He keeps his eyes on the looming shadows of ancient monsters outside, barely sees the mountains rolling by, looming, old, and impersonal.

“It could be Hydra,” he speaks up after a minute, and the truck jerks slightly to the side. 

“What?” she asks, voice unreadable.

“They had me,” he replies. _Just like they had yo_ \- No, that’s not right. Hydra didn’t have her, did they?

His brow lowers in thought.

It was something else. That knowledge feels right.

It’s silent.

The steering wheel leather creaks under her grip. 

“Rogers isn’t going to like this,” she says.

That’s only ever crossed his mind distantly, but she’s right. He’s not going to like this.

\--

They arrive in town during the day, drive in from the town’s outer limits and park somewhere in the winding backstreets. Barnes grabs his duffel out of the footwell in case they have to abandon the truck and hops out.

“They’ll know we’re here sooner than later,” he mutters on the sidewalk, just for her ears.

“They will,” she acknowledges, reaching over for his hand. He seamlessly entwines their gloved fingers together, trying to blend in with the other people out and about.

“Where do we start?” he asks.

She hums like she’s thinking. “The truck could use a new set of windshield wipers,” she answers lightly, “Think the nearest mechanic will have a set, hon?”

He smiles over at her and they share it, stepping close enough their shoulders bump.

“Worth a look, don’t you think?” he parrots. She gets an amused glint in her eye that’s gone in a flash, but he saw it there all the same.

“I think so,” she replies, leaning into his shoulder, “‘Sides, sooner we get that fixed, sooner we can get home.”

He doesn’t freeze mid-step like his brain wants, keeps his off-balance reaction internal.

Home. Steve. He wants to understand what both of those might mean to him, but he’s also apprehensive about going backwards, about being tied down for longer than he wants, about the weight of ‘Bucky’ that still doesn’t feel like him.

They subtly glance around as they walk, people dodging them on the sidewalk, weaving between them and payphones, blue mail boxes, snow piled up against the curb. There’s laughing, talking, tinny cellphone chatter and the occasional barking dog. He can smell the street, rubber, exhaust, fast food, the places the people passing them have gone. It’s peaceful on the surface, but what about underneath?

The mechanic garage is easy to find, even without knowing the town’s whole layout. Romanoff steers him left with a, “Oh! Coffee. I could use a pick-me-up first,” and he laughs, feels her tense fractionally against his side like it surprises her.

They slip into the coffee shop and he grabs a table while she breaks off to place their order.

They take turns observing the building and its surroundings while sipping their drinks, feel the coffee burn down their throats and warm their stomachs. They listen to the locals and other passer-throughs discuss town and surrounding area events. Barnes brings his cup closer to inhale the smell, drown out the scent of sweat, shoes, hormones, the road, people, their surroundings, just for a moment.

“There,” she says lowly half an hour later, just for him. 

He slants his eyes back toward the window.

A tow truck with the shop logo drives into the garage and a man in overalls gets out, heads inside. 

They both watch him go.

“That’s at least one,” she says, “We can’t afford to sit around and wait to see if there’s more.” She drains the last of her coffee for emphasis and he takes his time doing the same, trying to stretch out it just a little longer.

“Let’s go see a man about windshield wipers,” she says, standing. He offers to take her cup to the trash and feels her eyes on him the whole way, returns the smile he finds when he turns back around and they exit the shop, hand in hand.

The door to the garage shop _dings_ when they enter and the eyes he’s felt on them since crossing the street get heavier.

“Hey, there! How can I help you folks today?”

One man behind the counter, three more further in the building based on footsteps and heartbeats. The man behind the counter is calm, smells like oil and grease and something...vaguely, familiarly earthy underneath.

“You wouldn’t happen to have windshield wipers, would you?” Romanoff asks.

“We sure do,” the man smiles, “Any idea what size?”

“Pretty sure it’s an old Dodge, right hon?” she asks, turning to him, eyes glinting again, “Always gives that extra _kick_ at the start.”

“Sounds right,” Barnes replies, “Always five seconds in.”

She sighs, big and dramatically put upon, the last of it ending at the end of his internal, five-second count.

She vaults over the counter in a blur and gets the man pinned while Barnes grabs his wrist when he goes for the rifle under the counter. The man strains under her hand then grunts when she presses him further into the counter by the back of the neck.

“ _Wolves_ ,” he all but spits.

“We have some questions,” Romanoff says calmly, “Answer. This doesn’t have to end messy.”

“ _It always ends messy_ ,” Barnes and the man say in unison, eyes darting to each other.

Romanoff quirks a brow at him. “Why are you tracking Captain America?” she asks, eyes back on the hunter. He doesn’t answer and she flexes and tightens her fingers on the back of his neck.

“We got nothin’ to do with _Captain America_ ,” the man glares back over his shoulder, “And I ain’t got nothin’ more to say. Now let me go before I scream,” he growls out, voice lowered.

“Why? So you can shoot us?” Romanoff asks, “Or worse?”

“In the middle of town?” the man asks back, “What kind of people you think we are?”

_Steve sniffles, head bowed and body hunched forward, making him even smaller than he already is. “It’s fine, Buck...I-...” he croaks, sniffling harder._

_Bucky reaches out, pauses, then rests a hand on Steve’s shoulder, steps in close and reels him in. Steve’s forehead presses to his stomach and Steve’s shoulder shakes under his palm, then he shudders heavily before falling apart all at once, arms coming around Bucky’s back. They’re thin, like birds, Bucky thinks, but always surprising in their strength._

“The kind who cause grief and loss,” Barnes says, low and dangerous, sudden fire in his chest.

The man stares at him and Barnes stares him down right back, knows his eyes are glowing and arm is whirring softly but can’t give a damn.

“Would your friends in the back happen to know more than you do?” Romanoff asks.

The man’s eyes shift sharply back to her.

“You’re an organization,” she states, cool and unreadable where Barnes is anger and burning, “You report to someone.”

The man doesn’t say anything and after a moment, she moves in a flash, slamming his forehead down against the counter before lowering him to the floor.

“Let’s go have a talk with the others, shall we, _hon?_ ” she asks, already heading for the back hallway. 

Barnes sets his duffel down in a corner and follows.

\--

“So, not as organized as I gave them credit for,” she says as she extends a claw and wiggles it into the car door lock, “More underground, mob-like than S.H.I.E.L.D. Old school.” She jimmies the door open and slips inside, unlocking the passenger door. He gets in, shoving his duffel down into the footwell between his feet. “Did you know?” she asks, ripping out the ignition slot and fiddling with the wires, wiring the engine to life and then putting the car in gear, pulling forward.

“Maybe, once,” he replies, _A long time ago_.

She flicks the turn signal on and steers them out of town. “I think they knew about Rogers,” she speculates, “Maybe even about you. At least we have our next lead.”

He glances over and down at the folded up map between them and pulls it open. 

“Where’s closest?” she asks.

“Nebraska,” he reads off, eyes tracing over the red circle before looking back up, out the window.

\-----

“No, I’m fine, Tony,” Steve says.

“ _Are you sure? Because I can send some strippers over. Even werewolves like strippers, right?”_

“Tony,” Steve sighs, rolling his eyes. He wiggles his nose a little when he catches a whiff of a passing alley and keeps walking, smoothly weaving around any oncoming pedestrians. There’s not as many out at night as there is during the day, at least.

“ _Rogers,_ ” Tony sighs back, with quite a bit more drama laced through his voice. It’s almost impressive. “ _Accept the strippers. They work hard_.”

“What does Ms. Potts think about the strippers?” Steve asks, bemused with eyebrows raised.

“... _That they work hard but should work hard somewhere else?_ ” Tony replies, voice lilting up high on the end and cringe loud and clear as a bell. 

Steve’s lips curl up despite himself. Of all the marvels of the future, Tony might be his favorite, after Bucky. 

“ _Any word from your other half?_ ”

Steve sighs deeply. “No,” he forces out, fingers tightening on his phone, gloves creaking quietly. He turns the corner onto the next street, relaxing a little when it’s even less crowded. At least he can be distressed in relative peace.

“ _Something’ll pop up_.”

“You can’t promise that,” slips out before Steve can stop it.

“ _No?”_ Tony asks, _“Then my name isn’t Tony Stark_.”

“Technically it’s ‘Anthony’,” Steve tries for light, even though he can hear the strain in his own voice.

“ _Sure, **Steven**_.”

Steve’s lips twitch. He looks up from the light stretching across the pavement and squints up at the neon store sign. “Grocery time. I’ll call you back after?” Because he’s not ready to be alone for the night, not yet.

“ _Wow, how…thoughtful towards the produce of you, hanging up on me for them,_ ” Tony replies, “ _I see how it is, Rogers. But Sure. I’ll just be here languishing like the dairy. Call before I go stale_.”

The call disconnects and Steve pulls his phone from his ear, raising an eyebrow at it.

“O-kay then,” he says, hanging up and pocketing his phone before heading into the store. After a small, internally waged battle, he pulls it back out and taps open Pokemon Go just before crossing the threshold.

\-----

He kicks open the door and dodges gunfire, throwing in a string of lit firecrackers. He listens intently, hears a rapid heartbeat and a nearing, slower one and waits while the firecrackers go off, distract-

The gunfire abruptly cuts off and he rounds the corner, steps inside.

“I have some questions for you,” Romanoff says after the last of the firecrackers dies. The man tries to spit in her face and she neatly tips her head to the side to dodge it. “Your associates had more manners.”

Barnes glances out as he closes the door behind him.

\--

The next stop is harder to acquire, but turns out to be a variation of the same. All of the hunters they’ve found so far are good with their hands. The first were mechanics, the second an isolated engineer, the third a freelance architect. They all work jobs that afford them relative privacy and easily found distance from normal human society, as well as access to a fair amount of unaccounted for free time to presumably carry out their hunts. They destroy evidence quickly or don’t carry any that connect to anyone else at all. None of them talk, either, even with Romanoff asking the questions.

“I found no leads this time,” Romanoff states, opening the car door.

Barnes does the same, slipping inside. The hunter is still breathing, like the others, but he’ll wake soon. They need to leave. Unless-

“Should we stay to see if he calls anyone?” he asks.

“Perhaps,” Romanoff says, starting the car, “I’ve got to call Rogers, anyway,” she adds coyly.

He ignores her.

The past few missi- tasks, have afforded him a different kind of clarity. Having a goal has helped focus his mind. It is tricky to not get swallowed up by the distraction, let it dictate all of his thoughts and push his memories to the wayside. Rogers in and of himself is a whole other distraction he’s not ready to examine in any detail.

“You want me to pass along a message?” she asks. There’s another smile in her voice. It’s a frequent occurrence that still grates.

He says nothing, keeps his eyes out the passenger window like he has been.

“Suit yourself,” she says, nonchalant.

He watches the world go by until she parks a block away and wonders if that is him, if he is in danger of letting things go by just like the scenery was.

\--

They pull into a motel off the highway three hours later. Barnes checks them into a room while she waits out of sight. She’s too memorable, they’d agreed, her red hair too eyecatching. She feigns a lover and wraps herself around his arm as they head to the room, then sheds the skin as she releases him once they’re inside, pulling her phone out after they check for bugs.

“Hey, Rogers,” she greets into her phone after a few moments, lips curling while her eyes light on him, “You sound out of breath. Worried about me?”

Barnes can hear Rogers’ voice, is torn between focusing on it and tuning it out.

“Bucky?” she asks. His eyes dart sharply to her and she smirks briefly before putting it away so it’s not in her voice. “I’m keeping an eye out. I’ve gotten to meet some of those hunters you told me about. They’re just as friendly as you said they were.”

Steve’s voice sounds small and tinny.

“I’m fine,” Romanoff says, “Sweet of you to worry,” she teases.

Barnes picks up...stuttering? Stammering? Maybe both.

Romanoff’s smile widens into something like pleasure. “Talk to you soon.” She ends the call.

“You didn’t tell him about Hydra,” he says.

“I’m telling my boss,” she replies, eyes on her phone while she taps at the keys.

He turns his face more fully towards her.

“He’s watching Rogers, too,” she explains, pocketing her phone and looking up, “I’m taking first shower.”

He watches her all the way to the bathroom, staring even after the door is shut. He looks back forward.

Either they find the source of the hunt for Rogers first, or the hunters strike before they do. Or Hydra finds _him (or Rogers? Are they after Captain America? His mission was Stark, but_ _he can’t disclude Rogers, can he?_ ). It’s a race.

His fingers curl into fists.

One he’s not sure he’ll win.

\--

_“Hey, Buck.” “Yeah, Steve?” “You ever wonder what it’d be like if we were normal?”_

_Bucky slants him a look. Steve nudges their shoulders together._

_“You know what I mean. Human.”_

_Bucky looks back up at the purple stained sky, the stars finally coming out of the dark. The increase in smog has forced them to wait longer and longer, the stars, and them. Even though the factories means more jobs, Bucky kind of hates it. Hates the smells, too._

_“Sometimes,” he answers._

_It’s quiet for a minute._

_“You think my ma…”_

_Bucky rolls onto his side and looks at him. After a few moments, Steve turns his head and looks back._

_“I don’t know,” Bucky answers. He reaches over and takes Steve’s hand, gripping it. “But I do know that either way, in any world, you wouldn’t be alone.”_

_Steve grips his hand back tight, lower lip trembling faintly._

_“Thanks, Buck,” he whispers._

_“Any time, pal.”_

Barnes opens his eyes and stares across at the wall under the bed. In almost every memory he has of Steve, Steve is sad.

\-----

Steve takes a deep breath before tapping through to his contacts and hitting Tony’s number, raising his phone to his ear. It answers on the third ring.

“ _Ruler of the Nine Realms speaking_.”

Steve snorts. “I think Thor might take issue with that statement,” he tries to joke.

“ _Eh. Wouldn’t be the first time I angered a god. What’s up? Your voice sounds like a kid riding a bike for the first time. And by that, I mean not good. Just to be clear. Have you ever seen a kid try to ride a bike for the first time? Catastrophe._ ”

Steve tightens his hand on his phone. “A friend called,” he makes himself say, “Hasn’t seen our friend yet.”

“ _Ah_ ,” Tony replies, “ _Well, going by reputation, **our friend** will find something_.”

Steve stares straight ahead, barely sees the other people on the street and picks up the pace. “I don’t know,” he says quietly.

“ _Hey, what did I tell you? If our friend **and** I am looking, not to mention Jarvis. You’re welcome,” _ he adds away from the phone, presumably to Jarvis _, “Between the three of us, we’ll find something_. _Take a breath, Rogers_.”

Steve blows out the one he’d been holding and forces himself to take another.

“ _Just keep that up, and come over if you can’t_ ,” Tony says, “ _Now. What’d you buy? Anything good?_ ”

Steve blows out another breath, raising his bag a bit to look inside, doesn’t even notice his steps have slowed and his body has relaxed a little. “Bananas, grapefruit, meat, vegetables.”

“.. _.Did anyone tell you about the bananas?_ ”

Steve raises his head and lowers his bag, slightly alarmed. “No…? Why?”

“ _Nevermind. You’ll find out. Maybe you’ll be lucky and won’t even remember the difference_.”

Steve eyes the bag dubiously. “I don’t think I’ve ever been lucky,” he mutters, turning a corner-

Something chemical-potent smelling hits him square in the face and he gags and coughs, feels the chemicals invade his throat, his lungs, and hunches over.

“ _Rogers?_ ”

He coughs harder, hacking, bag sliding from his arm and crinkling loudly as it hits the sidewalk.

“I-” Steve coughs again, vision starting to go dark, “I-”

“ _ **Rogers?**_ ”

“Trouble-” Steve manages.

The phone slips from his hand and clatters to the ground, and he follows it soon after, barely hears, “ _ **Jarvis! ETA**_ ,” and a van door sliding open before rough hands grab him and everything goes dark, the last thing he hears is a van door sliding shut.


	14. In the beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm uploading two chapters right now so keep an eye out for the second one.

Tony lands with a hard _thunk_ and scans the area, eyes darting between the readouts. He bends down to pick up the Stark Phone, then looks around the street again, ignoring the squares of the readouts highlighting the faces of stunned civilians.

He takes off when he finds nothing, shooting up into the air like a rocket.

“Jarvis, re-dial last used number from the phone,” he commands. It rings, rings, _rings_ -

 _Rings_.

\-----

Barnes’ eyes dart up when her phone rings, hears her shift like lightning and it cuts out a second later. He listens, waiting, barely hears a male voice - _Stark_ \- saying _Rogers_ and _kidnapped_ and he’s up, eyes on her, the phone.

“Last known location?” she asks, all business.

“ _On the way to his apartment from the grocery store_ ,” Stark’s voice replies, “ _Found his bag and phone on the ground. Jarvis is scanning the local surveillance but there’s no security cameras where he disappeared from_.”

“ _Tch_ ,” Romanoff lets out, rolling up off the bed and heading for her bag, “Notify Fury. I’m going to try to tap an information source.” She hangs up and pulls a gun out of her bag, pulling the hammer back.

“The hunter didn’t contact anyone,” Barnes says, picking up his duffel and getting the hotel door open.

“I know,” she returns, shouldering her backpack and heading out to the car. 

Barnes closes the door behind him and follows, getting into the passenger seat.

“My contact should be able to find him,” she says, turning the ignition and pulling out of the parking lot, “He has a way of communicating with the other hunters. We do that, we get closer to finding Rogers.”

“I thought Rogers was just your assignment,” Barnes says, keeping his eyes straight ahead.

“He is,” she replies, “I never fail an assignment.”

That’s reassuring, if only slightly.

\-----

He groans, rolling his heavy head to the side. His mouth feels like it’s stuffed with cotton and his nose and throat burn. He tries to move- 

Chains rattle. He can’t move his arms. He tries to get his eyes open, but they’re almost heavier than his head is.

“ _He’s up_ ,” he hears, sort of, muddled, like it’s underwater.

“ _I can’t believe we kidnapped Captain America. I know he’s a were, but **still**_.”

“ _No ‘still’. He’s a were, just like all the others._ ”

It goes quiet, at least, thankfully, because his head starts pounding something awful. The last thing he remembers is the call from Nat, and then- something that burned. Chemicals? He manages to crack his eyes open only to slam them back shut, the single light from overhead piercing his skull. 

Heartbeats. He can hear heartbeats. Two? It’s hard to differentiate from the pounding. He tries to focus his senses.

Chains around his forearms, pulling them back, not enough to fully cut off circulation. His knees are sore from the hard ground. It’s cold, or would be to humans, cool, but not enough to warrant a winter environment. Something like a warehouse, or underground? A basement? He can smell...rust, rusted water, metal, sweat and gunpowder, oil, something familiarly earthy underlying it all.

His captors don’t say anything. They probably know he’s awake. Steve tries to wait them out. At least it gives him time to try and calm the pounding.

The sound of steps nearing. The heartbeats grow faster.

“We know you’re awake,” one of them says, older, late twenties? Accent. One Steve’s never heard before, but it curves, sharp, like a blade.

Steve cracks his eyes back open, squinting down at the floor. After a few moments, the sharp pain gradually lessens. It takes him a bit, he’s not sure how long, but eventually he can lift his head and get his eyes up.

There’s two of them in the shadows, the older one closer than the younger, but out of range of Steve’s limbs, in any form.

“We need information,” the older says.

 _Of course_ , Steve thinks, everyone always wants something out of him whether he can give it or not. Whether he remembers or not.

“What do you know about the wolves from this decade?” the older one asks.

A broad question. And honestly, Steve’s not feeling very cooperative.

\-----

The drive is silent after she leaves a message for her contact. Every second spent in transit is another second that grates.

Romanoff’s hands loosen fractionally on the steering wheel. Barnes focuses on the sound.

“I texted my boss,” she says, low and calm.

He glances over briefly at her hands as he tenses, then back to the passenger window, watching her faint reflection in the glass, an almost-silhouette in the backdrop of the passing scenery.

“You’re going to have to meet him if you want a better chance of finding Rogers,” she continues.

After a few moments, he finally turns his head to look at her, and she does the same.

“Ready to work in a ‘pack’?” she teases, lips curling at the edges even though her eyes remain steady, placid as the flat, still surface of a lake. Part of him wonders if it’s still underneath or if there’s teeth. Somehow, a deeper part of him whispers of jagged rocks and hard, solid, flat edges, something harder than stone to break your neck on.

“Steve is in danger,” he repeats from earlier, “I need to find him.”

Her lips curl up further before her eyes go back to the road. It feels like playing into her hand, but he doesn’t like any of the other choices.

\-----

The older slowly grows impatient, Steve can smell it, like sharp, bitter smoke on the air. He notices the younger glance between the two of them, the way his body hunches in slightly, like he’s scared. Steve can’t tell what he’s afraid of even though he can smell it, if it’s of him, the older one, or whatever caused them to kidnap him in the first place. It has to be something other than him being a werewolf, or else they would have just killed him. They still might. They’d asked about werewolves from this decade, but that’s too broad to pinpoint _what_ they want to know. He needs to try and...stall, maybe. Someone will notice he’s missing, Fury will notice, if not Carter, or both, he just needs to...buy time. Alright. Think. Information about wolves from this decade. Are they looking for a network, or someone in particular? Steve can’t remember if hunters have networks, but from the memories he has, they’re as much loners as werewolves are.

“ _Well_ ,” the older finally demands, body language stiff, confrontational, shoulders back and hands fisted. 

Steve keeps his poker face. He’s not sure he had a good one before, but he suspects it’s a good one now, if the mounting frustration in the man’s expression is anything to go by.

The man finally moves, stalks over to one of the stone pillars and throws a switch. Steve jolts before letting out a brief shout, electricity surging through his muscles, skin, bones, up and down his spine. He can feel it ricochet through the cavern of his ribcage. 

After what feels like an eternity, it cuts out and he goes slack like a ragdoll, head hanging forward while he pants.

“ _What. Do you know_ ,” the man demands, voice slightly distorted. 

Steve jerks his head a little, trying to shake the sounds back into order, and slowly pulls his nails back in when he realizes they’re out-

His gloves. His gloves are gone.

The switch flips again with a _click_ and he lets out another yell, longer this time, body jerking and chains clamoring.

It’s going to be a long night.

\-----

Her phone finally rings and Barnes listens to the _click_ of her taking the call. She keeps her eyes on the road and doesn’t make a move to pull over, put some distance between them, so he listens as she brings the phone up to her ear.

“ _Said you got a job for me_?”

Male, mid-thirties.

“I do,” she replies, picking almost innocently at a thread in the hem of her sleeve, “I need you to get in touch with some old contacts and find out where they’d keep a werewolf Captain America contained for questioning or torture.”

Silence.

“ _ **Why** do you do this to me?” _ the male voice...whines, _“Why is it never something simple_?”

Her lips twitch. “Because I enjoy the sound of your devastation,” she replies sweetly.

A tinny, heavy sigh.

“If you’re lucky, I’ll let you meet the ghost.”

“ _Aw, Nat, you know I’m never lucky_ ,” the voice whines, “ _I’ll get back to you in twenty._ ” The call ends with a _beep_.

“You have a hunter on hand?” Barnes asks. 

She smiles down at her phone before tapping something quick out on the keypad, turning her eyes back up to the road while pocketing it. “Something like that,” she replies.

“Why didn’t we go to him first?” he demands. They could have had information long before Steve-

“My friend isn’t well liked by the _hunter community_ ,” she answers, pointedly sarcastic, “I’ve just sent him on a death mission.”

Barnes doesn’t say anything to that, but he thinks she probably knows what he’s thinking: better her friend than Steve.

“Time to meet the boss,” she says. 

He keeps his eyes out the window, fingers curling against the armrest.

\-----

The electricity stops again and Steve immediately sags forward against his restraints, forehead barely pressing against the cool cement. It sends a shiver down his spine, breaths puffing hot and rebounding back against his face.

The man doesn’t say anything. The younger’s heartbeat is jumping in his chest.

Well, that makes two of them. The older must be more experienced in torture.

Wait- There’s not just two anymore.

Steve tries to drag his head back up, but it’s like trying to lift a mountain, never mind trying to move the rest of his body.

Footsteps, lighter, slower.

“He’s a tough bastard,” the man says, his heavier steps retreating with the younger one’s and taking his voice further away, “We’ll need to move to more extreme measures if we want to get this done before tomorrow morning. He’s too noticeable to keep for much longer than that.”

So they’re on a deadline. 

Steve clenches his jaw against another round of nausea, inner lips pulling against the extended sharp edges of his teeth. He tries to reel them and his claws back in and his hands give small spasms. He stops.

A door creaks open then closed, taking the slower, lighter steps away. His torturer nears again but stops just outside of his range.

“You’ll talk before then,” the man states. 

Steve’s not sure if that’s true or not anymore.

\-----

His torturer doesn’t say much more over the next- he doesn’t know how long, nor do the shocks continue as consistently. They’re spaced out at random intervals that Steve can’t find sense in, and set at random levels, sometimes enough that he blacks out until a boot kicks hard across face, sometimes just low enough to make him _almost_ relax before it’s amped up a hundred levels higher. Sometimes the shocks are followed by the same question: “ _What do you know?_ ” Just enough to tempt Steve into talking to make it all stop.

He tries to go somewhere else in his head, some place where his body isn’t violently twitching, a quarter of the way into grotesquely shifted, some point between _man_ and _beast_ , some place where he isn’t screaming or dry heaving because his stomach was emptied a while ago. He’s not sure he really succeeds. Even thinking about Bucky, or his mother only does so much to take him out of his aching body. Besides, he’s not sure he wants them here, like this. He doesn’t want to stain the few good memories he has with more pain.

Eventually, he vaguely hears the door _squeal_ open some time later, and the pause in pain gives him a chance to try and breathe past all the recent burning going on throughout his body, his limbs, his _brain_. It feels like even his eyelashes hurt.

A different set of steps come closer, door squeaking shut on its hinges. They’re lighter, but solid and steady, focused, even, if the sound of footsteps can be focused. They’re different from all the other ones he’s heard. At least the thinks they are.

They stop a little ways away.

It’s quiet, just the sound of his gradually decreasing ragged breathing.

“Just tell them what you know, Rogers.”

Steve stirs a little, chains rattling softly while he tries to lift his head and eyelids, because he _knows_ that voice.

They step into the light and his eyes slowly pan up a slender black boot, up further, up until he sees gold hair feathered out and framing her face.

“Carter…?” he asks, voice a croak.

“Just give them what they want, Steve,” she says, soft but firm, and for a minute he sees brown hair and red lipstick, a brown uniform dress in place of jeans, shirt, and a jacket.

 _A jacket. They **are** somewhere cold_ , the tactical part of his mind whispers, mostly buried under white noise.

He shakes his head slightly. “I don’t...know anything.”

She glances back for a few moments. He forgot about his captors. She shouldn’t be here-

Steve shakes his head again. “It’s just me,” he says, almost a whisper, and for some reason, he wants to cry, the backs of his eyes stinging.

She slowly steps forward and crouches down. “Are you sure?” she asks, even softer than the last time.

“Yeah,” he croaks, closer to a whisper.

It’s just him. It’s always just been him. He’s so _alone_.

She watches him steadily before rising to her feet and half turning to look back towards the man. 

“I think he might be telling the truth,” she says.

“ _No_ ,” the man says firmly, stepping into the light, brown eyes boring down on him, “Tell me about the metal armed wolf.”

Steve’s insides freeze. He didn’t think they could do that ( _again_ ).

“I don’t-” he starts.

“Enough!” the man yells, stalking over and smacking the switch again. Steve jolts, biting out another shout. He must bite through his tongue this time because he tastes blood, feels it drip out the corner of his mouth down to his chin.

The electricity stops and he drops. 

“You will speak the truth!” the man yells, “One way or another.”

“I don’t-” Steve tries again. The switch flips and stays on longer this time. He vaguely hears the chains rattling as his body convulses and Carter half-shouting something. After what feels like an eternity, it stops and he drops forward as far as his body can go, forehead pressing into the cool cement and head lolling to the side while he pants and shakes, elongated fingers curled loose and twitching in the air. It takes him a minute, but he finally registers the man and Carter still arguing-

“ _You’re going to **kill** him_ -”

“ _He killed my mother!_ ” the man yells.

Steve stills and Carter goes quiet.

“All you wolves do is _run_ and _kill_ ,” the man bites out, taking a step towards him. Steve lolls his head enough to glance up at him, sees the man’s body hunched forward like a prowling beast, blurred in his periphery, fists curled in anger. The comparison almost makes him laugh. “She was the best hunter we ever knew. She lead us with- with _strength_ and _love_. She took me and my brother in when she had no reason to! We were orphans! And you- you wolves _killed her!_ ”

The memory _slams_ into him like a freight train-

_“Ma! I’m home!” Steve calls, pulling his key out of the front door as he steps inside. He stills, listening. “Ma?” No heartbeats. Nothing. His eyes dart around. He can smell her, her scent layers over every surface, but it’s hours old. Hours. She should’ve been home-_

_He sprints back out the door, doesn’t bother closing it._

_“Bucky!” he shouts as he pounds down the stairs. Bucky whips around on the last step, eyes widened._

_“Steve?”_

_“She’s gone!” Steve shouts, grabbing his sleeve hard enough to make Bucky jerk, “I can’t find her!” He lets go and runs out the door, hears Bucky’s steps pound after._

_Steve scents the air, tries to find her smell in all the cold. Wolf noses work better than dog’s in the snow. He should be able to-_

_He catches it and runs, Bucky hot on his heels until he’s at Steve’s side. They run through alleys and backstreets, ignore the people they run into, who run into them, the ones who yell. They’re all background to his mother’s scent in his nose, rising and falling in thinner and heavier areas of people. But it’s there, Steve’s got it, he just needs to find her-_

_Her scent leads them out of the city, out into the nearest forest. They slow when the scent scatters in different directions and with a nod at each other, split up, Bucky going left while Steve goes straight._

_It feels like hours before Steve hears Bucky’s shouted, “ **Steve!** ” and he takes off, weaves around trees, jumps over fallen trunks. He skids to a stop in his shoes in the snow as soon as he sees red, Bucky’s clothed back dull browns and tans to the sharp relief of a pale blonde paw in the snow, of dark red pooled out from-_

_“Steve,” Bucky says quietly. Steve’s vision of her blurs and he wipes roughly at his eyes, finally gets his legs to work and jerks forward a few more steps._

_“Ma…?” he asks, strangely quiet in the middle of the forest._

_She doesn’t move._

_He drops on his knees, hands slowly reaching out, hovering over her muzzle, her cheek, her ear. Her scent has dulled, staled. Steve’s hands shake._

_“ **Ma…?** ” he croaks, fingers twitching when they barely brush her fur._

_Like a dam released, Steve shuffles forward quickly on his knees, cradles and lifts her head onto his thighs. He gently brushes the snow off her fur, vision blurring until she becomes a mirage in a sea of red and white._

_“Ma,” he croaks roughly, lurching forward and letting out a sob into her fur. He feels Bucky move, feels his weight settle next to him in the snow and an arm wrap around his back, heat press all along and into his side._

_Steve sobs harder, shakes, an internal battle waged against the inside of his skin, rattling against his bones and trying to get out into the air._

_She’s-_

Steve grits his teeth.

“You’re _nothing_ but savage _vermin_ -”

“ _And what about mine!?_ ” Steve shouts, surging up and forward against his restraints with all he has.

It goes silent.

“ _What about mine?_ ” Steve growls out, “You left her...you left her _lying there_ in the _snow_. She never-...she never hurt _anyone_. She was a _nurse!_ She _saved_ people _every day!_ And you just- _left her there_ like she was _nothing_.” His voice cracks and Steve lowers his head, tries to swallow past his closing throat, eyes burning. He can feel the loss like it was yesterday, like it just happened, a deep ache in his chest that threatens to swallow him whole. “ _She was all I had_ ,” he croaks, voice wobbling, biting his lower lip roughly when the tears slide hot down his cheeks, sees them hit the floor, “ _She never hurt anyone_.” 

He shouldn’t, he knows he shouldn’t, but he drops and presses his forehead to the floor and shakes from sobs that roar up his throat and out past the cage of his teeth, hit the floor and bounce back into his face with the weight of the memory. Most of it was gone, and now he has it back and it _hurts. It hurts so **much.**_

 _Bucky_ , Steve can’t help thinking, begging, body shaking and rocking forward, chains pulling at the skin of his forearms. God, he doesn’t care. _**Please. I don’t want to be here**_.

\-----

Her phone vibrates and he looks back over. She pulls it out, glancing down from the road while she lights up the screen.

“He got the location,” she says, pocketing her phone before slamming on the breaks and jerking the wheel to the side, slinging him into the passenger door with the momentum. She steps on the gas and the tires squeal beyond the glass against his temple, then they’re propelling back the way they came. “Buckle up?” she teases, lips curling and teeth sharp.

Barnes flexes his fingers, extends them into claws and her smirk gets as sharp as they are.

“They’re meeting us there,” she says, “Do me a favor and don’t kill anyone. Makes for bad negotiations.”

“If Steve’s dead, they are, too,” he replies. 

“I can live with that,” she says, pushing the car faster.

\-----

“She never hurt anyone,” Steve repeats, after the tears have stopped. His throat hurts for five more seconds before the pain is gone, but the rough, scratchiness is still there. He’s thirsty, he realizes distantly. “She didn’t-...she didn’t have to _die_ -”

“No,” a voice says, low and firm and older, older than all of the people in the room. Steps near, the lighter, slower ones, punctuated by the rhythmic _thunk. Thunk. Thunk_ of a cane. Not Carter. 

Steve didn’t hear the steps come back.

He drags his head up when they get close enough and sees an older man step out of the shadows, hair shoulder length and streaked through with gray, face hard and set, worn firm and rough around the edges. 

“One exception does not change the rules,” the man says.

“...You’re wrong,” Steve returns, staring defiantly up with all the regained fire he has in his chest, “One exception changes everything.” From the rules to the morality. One exception proves possibility, and makes them guilty for all the rest.

“Have you ever killed a human?” the man asks.

Steve pauses, thrown off track by the question.

The man steps closer, around more to his side and raises his cane, tapping it against Steve’s right hand. Steve jerks it, tries to move it away.

“That looks experiment-related,” the man observes, “You kill whoever did it?”

Steve frowns slightly, but the memory is there, and then...the missing pieces resurface, too.

“ _Don’t touch me_ ,” he growls low, eyes wide and unfocused, body slowly shaking all over again for a different reason, so tense it _hurts_ , “Don’t touch me,” he whispers, “Stay-”

“ _-back! Stay away from me!”_

_“Now, now, Captain, just a little prick-”_

_The needle slips into the top of his hand and Steve tries to flex his way through the restraints, weak as he is. He’s already tried, he’s **been** trying, but the more drugs they use, the more his body has a hard time burning through them. It’s already taking too long-_

_His body jerks, head snapping back against the table as his bones snap and break, muzzle elongating with the forced change-_

_Something comes down so hard on his right hand Steve doesn’t even really feel it at first, in the middle of the change, and then it’s a blanketing cold-numb before spreading fire-_

_The sound of bones having broken when they shouldn’t finally registers and the pain slams into him and he **screams,** a distorted yell caught between **human** and **not** -_

_Something bangs sharp and loud and then the room fills with noise, so much noise: gunfire and shouts and bodies hitting things on the way to the floor, metal trays crashing and rattling. The only thing Steve really sees through his blurry vision when he turns his head is Bucky’s glowing eyes, like the climax of fireworks in the hot Brooklyn summers, glowing a hot white in the dark and shadows with his teeth bared-_

Steve blinks back to the present, stares, trying to focus- 

The door bangs open sharp and loud and Steve jumps, chains rattling. The room floods with people in black tac gear and for a minute, Steve thinks he’s in his memory, and then he sees him.

He forgot. How Bucky’s eyes glow bright hot like burning stars when he’s pissed to high hell. He moves smoother now, but Steve can see the anger in the lines of his body, in his stare, like pinpricks of retribution come calling, ablaze in the depths of dark shadows.

Steve hears his low, deadly growl and shudders.

What else did he forget?


	15. The undisclosed desires of your heart

The man with the cane steps away to talk with or confront someone while the younger one shouts and the youngest shadows him, but all Steve can focus on is Bucky making a beeline towards him, watches him kneel down and undo the chains. Steve pitches forward and one of Bucky’s hands goes to his shoulder while the other grips the side of his face.

“Steve,” Bucky says, low and urgent. His eyes are still burning. God, this is the first time Bucky’s touched him since he left and Steve leans into him, has to anyway, since his body is refusing otherwise.

“Hi,” Steve replies. Everything he wanted to say to Bucky up to this point and it’s all out the window.

Bucky huffs out a faint breath and Steve smells _him_ and _coffee_.

“Coffee sounds good,” Steve mumbles. Bucky shifts his hand and briefly pulls one of his eyelids up.

“You’re delirious,” he says, letting go, voice as flat and unreadable as his face now is.

“I’m not-...maybe,” Steve admits, too tired to argue.

There’s commotion going on beyond his periphery, heated voices and yelling, talking and a symphony of erratic heartbeats. 

Bucky’s arm tightens around him, hard and solid and secure, and all Steve can see is the white glow fading to gray blue and thinks: _If I wasn’t sure before, I love him now_.

\-----

The man stares, leaning forward on his forearms braced on his thighs. He has blonde hair, rough features, rough hands.

Barnes holds still.

The man keeps staring. “So you’re the ghost,” he finally says.

Barnes stares back.

“ _And_ Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes of the Howling Commandos,” the man continues, “Cap’s _best friend_.”

Barnes stares, keeps his discomfort to himself.

The man throws his hands up and Barnes tenses. The door opens and the man throws a look at Romanoff as she steps inside. “I can’t believe this! It’s really happening. _It’s really real. I’ve finally snapped_.”

“Don’t say I never did anything for you,” Romanoff replies, lips curling up.

“What’s happening?” the man asks more seriously.

“Well,” she starts, “Rogers is still recovering from the drugs and torture, but he should be released in a couple hours,” she directs towards Barnes, “Fury’s meeting with the hunters to try and reach a compromise, as well as come up with a joint plan to take down Hydra. They’ve been aware of the hybrid experiments for a while, but only recently managed to gather enough intel to begin infiltration. Since their skills and equipment are lacking in the spy department, that’s where S.H.I.E.L.D. will step in.”

“‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’, huh?” the man asks.

Barnes narrows his eyes fractionally.

“Or, uh, ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’?” the man asks with a wince.

“As for you,” Romanoff adds. Barnes’ eyes snap back up to her. “You’re to be put under observation and you’re not to leave the premises. Given that Rogers is here and injured, that shouldn’t be too difficult to accomplish, for now.”

Barnes watches her steadily and she watches him back. It’s a game for her. It’s...annoying.

“Barton,” she says, switching focus to the man, “Hill wants words with you.”

The man, Barton, groans, pushing back into his seat. “ _No_.”

“Defying a direct order?” she teases, clearly enjoying his torment, just like she’d said before.

“No,” Barton groans again, shoving himself up to his feet, “I’m going. I’m dreading it, but I’m going. It was cool meeting you, ghost,” he adds on his way out with a short wave.

Barnes watches him go before looking back to Romanoff.

“Med floor three, room eighty-five,” she says, “You can see him after your medical examination.”

He tenses, gaze sharpening with his teeth.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. needs to know what happened and whether your body is hiding anymore surprises,” she explains, “It will be external only, and scans for the internal.”

He stares at her, weighing his options.

They might drug him and take him away, lock him up again, run tests. Maybe they’ll find a way to turn him into a machine again, maybe they already have. Is seeing Steve really worth it?

But. What if there are more things hidden in his body besides the tracker he removed from his arm, things he doesn’t know about. He doesn’t trust S.H.I.E.L.D., but maybe that man Barton had a point about using his enemies. And maybe he’ll also get to see Steve.

“You want me to go with you and hold your hand?” Romanoff teases, breaking him out of his thoughts. 

He narrows his eyes slightly and stands, heading for the door.

“Med floor three, room eighty,” she says with a smirk he can still hear, “You can see Steve after. I vouched for you to keep your freedom in the building, for now. Don’t make me regret it.”

“Why would you do that?” he asks.

She watches him for a moment before turning to go out the other door. 

He watches her leave, then does the same, heads for the elevator, pausing when he catches a whiff of something...familiar.

He stands there for five minutes trying to remember. When nothing surfaces but _unease_ , he presses the button for the elevator and makes his way to the examination room, a little faster than he’d intended.

\-----

“We want the metal armed wolf.”

“I’m not willing to compromise on him,” Fury replies.

Rheighan leans back a bit into the couch, hands overlapped in front of him on top of his cane. “You want to use him as a weapon. We want him for revenge.”

Fury glances to the other two men either side of Rheighan, the older one standing with his arms crossed and the younger, perpetually worried looking one sitting on the couch.

“I still can’t compromise on him,” Fury states.

“Trying to appease the Captain,” Rheighan returns.

“Well, it has been seventy years and Rogers thought he was dead for about two months.”

“Then let them have a reunion,” Rheighan says, “But we _are_ taking him. He has something to answer for.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt he has a lot to answer for,” Fury replies, “But all that traces back to Hydra. Which, might I add, is why we’re meeting at all now. So,” he adds, keeping his gaze steady, “Do you want the gun, or the people who fired it?”

Rheighan is quiet while he thinks, as unreadable as a practiced politician, but the younger ones are easier to read.

“We don’t _need_ them!” the older one bursts out, right on cue.

“ _Janae_ ,” Rheighan scolds with an accent Fury can’t quite place.

“We don’t!” Janae argues back, “We have the means now to get in on our own. We should just take the wolf and _go_.” He stares down at Rheighan who stares back.

“What do you think?” Rheighan asks before turning his head to the youngest one, who fidgets slightly, taking a moment before looking back. 

“He killed Olivia,” he says, soft yet decisive, “But if what they say is true, we should have been hunting Hydra.” He glances up at Janae.

“He’s a wolf!” Janae bursts out again.

“And we’re hunters,” the youngest one replies, “Haven’t we taken loved ones, too?” he asks quieter.

Janae rears up. “I can’t believe you’re siding with _animals_ ,” he bites out.

“But he was crying,” the youngest one replies. The room goes quiet. “We’ve hunted bad weres before, but...he said we killed his mom, who never hurt anyone...Maybe we’ve killed innocent ones, too-”

“There’s no such thing as an innocent wolf,” Janae grounds out.

“That means none of us are, either,” the youngest says, soft and quiet, “It was fine when it was right. There are bad wolves out there. But...He’s _Captain America_ , and this...this doesn’t feel right.” He glances nervously to Rheighan, who stares back, unreadable, then drops his eyes to the floor.

‘You both have valid points,” Rheighan says, “We all must make a choice.”

“There’s no choice to be made,” Janae says low.

“Let me know what you decide,” Fury says, “There’s a conference room three doors down the hall you can use.”

The two hunters rise and all three head for the door.

“But between you and me,” Fury adds, “I think those boys have suffered enough. For all of it.”

Rheighan glances at him and then they’re out the door, the youngest meekly closing it behind them.

The hidden door to his right slides open.

“What do you think they’ll decide?” Carter asks, stepping into the room.

“Two out of three that they want him,” Fury replies.

‘You’re not giving him up, right?” she asks.

Fury leans back in his chair, turning his head to look out the windows. He doesn’t say anything, but she’s learned to read his silences.

\-----

He pauses outside the door, listening, then steps forward enough that it slides open and walks inside. His nose is hit with the smell of lavender and there’s two people clattering around, just like he’d heard, moving things about the room. The familiar smelling one notices him first.

“Hey, there, murder wolf. Come on in,” Stark greets.

Barnes takes the last step far enough away that the door stops reading his presence and slides closed. 

“Strip off your clothes so we can get started, or at least everything above the waist, if you’re feeling shy,” Stark says, moving around more equipment into some sort of order that makes sense to him, “I need to get a look at that arm. The Doc, Rosalind,” he adds with a flirty grin sent her way, “Will be conducting the physical examination.” Stark looks up to him with semi-wide eyes in the middle of pushing and raises a hand to cup the side of his mouth, mouthing, ‘ _You lucky weredog’_.

Barnes frowns slightly but after another glance at the doctor, slowly moves to comply.

“Alright!” Stark announces after another minute and Barnes has completed his task, “Step on over here, big pooch, and let me know immediately if you need to stop. Rosland and I both like our faces in tact. As well as the rest of us.”

Barnes moves over and slowly takes a seat on the stool Stark gestures to by one of the pieces of equipment, back ramrod straight. The sterile smell of the room is mostly drowned out by the incense burning from three spots on the counter, but the underlying hint of it is still threatening to unearth...things, memories maybe, pushing gently at his awareness. He doesn’t like the feeling and tries to focus on the lavender instead.

Stark steps closer, raising...something that projects light from the end, facing him.

“Remember,” Stark says, looking down at him, “Let us know.” An image of another man overlays his in slacks and dress pants, and Barnes stares. The sudden flash takes him by surprise and creates sparks behind his eyes.

\--

The smell has mostly dissipated, is what he notices first, the smell of electrical burns that had put him on edge in the building he’d raided with S.H.I.E.L.D. and had kept him away (that and the agents) has all but disappeared. The second thing he notices is the deja vu. Steve isn’t hooked up to a bunch of wires or tubes, just a simple IV to help his system replenish energy and help with the mild dehydration. His mind turns Steve small, overlays the image of him as he is now, paints the sheets light tan and changes the lighting to something dimmer, organic instead of false.

Barnes can’t trust it, and after a moment, it fades away. He walks over to the side of the bed.

With the electrical smell gone, he can smell everything else. Steve doesn’t smell as sweet as he did the last time they were in the same space, but there’s still a hint of it there, underlying and infused into what is apparently his normal scent. He smells like spiced, fresh leaves and earth, and something undefinable that might be the sky or sunlight.

Barnes’ fingers curl.

He still doesn’t know what home is, but he wants it to smell like Steve. His scent relaxes all of him, animal and human. It’s dangerous, but maybe that’s what home is? Feeling comfort and safety and letting your guard down.

He reaches over and pulls the nearest chair closer, keeping it quiet, and sits, putting himself between Steve and the door. He watches Steve breathe and tries to keep himself from reaching for his hand. It kicks up snow behind his eyes and Barnes tries to swallow past the feeling of falling, Steve’s scream of his other name echoing loud in his head.

He squeezes his eyes shut, fingers curling tight over the edges of the armrests.

\-----

“Gentlemen,” Fury greets as the door opens and the hunters step back in, “Come to a decision?”

They come to a stop in front of his desk, Rheighan’s hands coming to rest overlapped on his cane, Janae and the youngest flanking him.

“We want the wolf,” Rheighan says, “We take him or there’s no deal.”

“I thought you might say that,” Fury replies. There’s a beep from his desk, right on time. “Might I redirect your attention to the screen,” he says, gesturing a hand to the opposite wall, “I’m going to show you who you’ve been hunting.”

The hunters all turn and he presses a button. The large, long glass screen on the opposite wall lights up with file folders.

“Open latest examination file,” Fury instructs to the room at large. One of the file folders opens and images of Barnes flood the screen. 

He’s shirtless in all of them, images of him from the front, side, back, closeups of the arm and where it attaches to his shoulder, brain scans. Fury taps the mirrored layout in the surface of his desk and brings the frontal shot to the forefront with a picture of Barnes from 1942 for comparison, smiling and young to contrast with the worn and ragged.

“This is Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes before he shipped off to war in 1942, and this is from thirty minutes ago,” he starts, “Going off of what we know about Rogers, he’s roughly, physically thirty years old, and about ninety-seven if you count the time gaps we don’t have many answers for.”

He sees Janae and the youngest shift.

“According to the scans I just had conducted and what little he was willing to say, or not say, he’s had repeated, electrical shocks to his brain, resulting in what our doctors quickly determined to be years of damage and scarring, and amnesia. From what I’ve gathered, he doesn’t even fully remember his childhood best friend.”

Rheighan half turns to look back at him. “Is this supposed to make us sympathetic?”

“Maybe,” Fury replies, “But mostly to understand. You say he killed one of yours, and he’s definitely killed some of ours, but that doesn’t mean he remembers. Hydra never let him. He’s a tool to be used, and maybe put away somehow, given that he’s barely aged in seventy years. That, or werewolves age slower than I thought.”

Rheighan studies him for a moment before looking back to the screen.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Fury says, “He’s dangerous and he’s killed a lot of people, and he’d make a great asset to S.H.I.E.L.D., but that doesn’t mean I think he deserves the slow torture he’s already been put through, or the one you have planned for him. Werewolf or not, no one deserves this.” He nods his chin towards the pictures and scans, and watches the three of them take it all in.

\-----

Steve slowly starts to stir after an hour, first his eyes shifting beneath his eyelids and then his fingers giving a few faint, sporadic twitches. When his eyes start to open, Barnes wants to bolt. When they slowly shift to take in the room and eventually land on him, he tightens his fingers on the armrests.

“Bucky,” Steve says, soft and wondrous. It feels wrong to have his name said that way, to have that look directed at him. “You’re here.”

“I’m not Bucky,” Barnes replies after a moment, voice hushed.

Steve stares at him for a few moments before lowering his eyes. His fingers twitch and then he turns his damaged hand over and shifts it closer to the edge of the bed, a hesitant but clear invitation.

Barnes curls his own tighter around the armrests before slowly relaxing and reaching one out. As soon as their skin meets, it’s like...a spark and wave of calm all at once, _energizing_ and _soothing_ occupying the same space. It’s like being alive and feeling every second of it without repercussion or worry. It’s like finally having something to hold onto and only then realizing that he needed it. It’s like taking a first breath.

They slowly trace each other’s fingers and palms with their own, Barnes feeling the grooves and raises of the mottled skin, and at some point, their fingers slide and lock together. It feels like it might be near impossible to remove them.

 _I shouldn’t feel this_ , one part of his mind whispers. _I was made to feel this_ , whispers another. They both feel true.

He leans forward in a slight daze as he brings Steve’s hand up and rubs his cheek against the back of it, freezing when he realizes what he’s doing. He glances up and Steve’s eyes are wide, cheeks and ears red.

“Buck?” Steve asks hesitantly.

Barnes slowly lowers Steve’s hand, looking at it as he sits back. He hears Steve swallow.

“Scent marking,” Steve says quietly, “Family and mates do it to each other to claim and reaffirm bonds.”

He stares down at Steve’s longer fingers. He can’t remember ever doing that.

“We used to do it sometimes,” Steve continues quietly, “We were family, Buck-...Sorry.”

They fall into silence after that. He should let go of Steve’s hand, but it’s...hard ( _when did he stop thinking of him as ‘Rogers’?_ )

“Thank you,” Steve says after a while. Barnes looks back up and Steve’s eyes find his. “For coming to get me. I didn’t tell them anything about you, but I’m not sure how long I would have lasted.” Steve’s gaze goes far away. “I’m not really who I used to be. I don’t think the old me would’ve been in danger of breaking so quickly.”

“Maybe it made you stronger,” Barnes says after a moment, drawing Steve’s eyes back, “Maybe you’re stronger now than before.” He’s not really sure, though. He’s not sure about much that has to do with the past or who they were, to themselves or each other.

“Maybe,” Steve says, quiet, too, “The same goes for you.” 

Barnes’ lips twitch of their own accord. “We might never know.”

Steve hums in agreement, tangling their fingers together again. “I’m sorry about...what we did. Before. I shouldn’t’ve-...You didn’t know what you were doing, did you.”

Barnes glances back up from their hands.

Steve drags his own eyes up, watching him, swallows.

Barnes considers it. 

“My body knew,” he decides, “I knew enough.”

“Maybe,” Steve replies, “But neither of us were in the position to really agree to it.”

“You regret it?” Barnes asks.

Steve pauses. “Only that...I feel like I took advantage of you. I didn’t want that.”

Barnes looks down, rubs his thumb briefly over Steve’s knuckles. “I didn’t want to think about it,” he confesses, “Because I _wanted_ to think about it. Weapons don’t want.”

“...I did,” Steve says.

That draws his eyes back up.

He hadn’t considered Rogers a weapon, like him. But he is. He belongs to S.H.I.E.L.D. just like the Soldier belongs to Hydra.

“I do,” Steve continues, whispers, mottled fingers gripping his tightly, “Buck- I-” he swallows, “...I love you.”

Barnes stares.

Steve’s eyes search his, he can see it, processes it, logically, but all he feels is _warmth_ and _lost_.

They stare at each other. 

Barnes can’t say it back. He can’t say anything, but he doesn’t let go of Steve’s hand, either.


	16. Power and Control

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **HEY. Please Read This:** There is some content in this chapter that some might consider...sensitive. If you want to know what it is before reading, just leave a comment at the bottom asking and I will tell you. There is also some gore, so if that bothers you, it's towards the bottom. You'll know when it's getting close. I just don't want to spoil things by adding tags, just yet. If ever. I think I'll just leave this up and people can ask as they feel necessary.

“You didn’t say it back,” Romanoff says.

“No,” Barnes replies, frowning down at his food tray. It’s...solid food. Hydra never gave him solid food; he wasn’t expecting S.H.I.E.L.D. to. He doesn’t think it will live up to Logan’s, though.

“Did you tell him about Hydra?” she asks next, starting in on her noodles. He decides to tackle the jiggling blue blob first. It’s difficult to keep it on the fork, so he switches to a spoon.

“You know I didn’t,” he replies, feeling an unusual amount of satisfaction when he manages to complete the task of keeping the wiggly blue on his spoon long enough to get it into his mouth. Chewing it, however, is another matter.

“You should be the one to tell him,” she says, edges of her lips just visibly curled at the look on his face while she takes a sip of water, “He’ll have questions and grief only you can address.”

“You want to use us to gather information,” he deduces, _still_ trying to lick the sweet taste out from where it’s slithered into between his teeth. Her motive is not hard to figure out.

“Of course,” she replies easily, popping something green and odd shaped into her mouth, “What else are you good for,” she adds with a smirk. Another joke. He thinks.

“Maybe I should sit with Barton,” he considers.

“Oh, God,” Romanoff says.

Yes, he will try sitting with Barton, if only to annoy her (unless she’s pretending to be annoyed so he will. She’s difficult to read).

-

“So, the hunters finally decided to cooperate,” she says twenty minutes later, walking with him down one of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s many halls, “But only if you join in on the op.”

“They want me dead or captured,” he says.

“Dead,” she returns, “You killed a hunter named Olivia. Apparently she was very important to them.”

He tries to think.

“I don’t know that name,” he concludes.

“Maybe not now,” she says, “From what they said, sounded like she was one of your missions.”

He wracks his brain, picks through what he remembers while trying not to tip over mentally stacked boxes of catastrophe and pain, but he still draws a blank.

“They used to give me pictures sometimes, to identify targets,” he says.

“I’ll try to find one,” she replies, “Off to see Steve?”

He glances at her before breaking off to head to the elevator.

“ _Remember what I said about the premises_ ,” she calls.

He presses the button for the medical floor while listening to her steps and heartbeat retreat, cut off when the doors slide closed. He watches out the glass as the elevator rises, the ground and bushes and trees sinking further and further beneath his feet. He shifts his eyes back up to watch the numbers take him higher and higher-

The elevator slows to a stop at floor twenty-seven, not his floor, and he takes a step back as the doors open and someone steps inside. He’s run into a few people while using the elevator, but none who were the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Barnes hasn’t seen him since the raid.

He holds himself still, tensing fractionally when the Director presses a button for a floor five below his own destination, watching the only angle he has on the Director’s profile. Either he’s really going there, or this is about to be an even shorter, more violent ride than Barnes thought. 

The Director turns a little and looks at him, studies him, and Barnes’ eyes snap up to his face, keeping his fingers from curling.

“You don’t remember me, do you,” the Director says, not a question.

Barnes stares, wracking his brain for the second time today. He tenses further when the Director reaches up, pausing when he only lifts his eyepatch.

“You don’t remember this?” the Director asks.

Barnes blinks, slightly taken aback. He stares closer at the scar, the bold one going diagonally down the middle of his eye, above and below it, and the two fainter ones either side of it.

His fingers twitch.

“No,” he answers.

The Director stares at him until the elevator begins to slow, lowering his eyepatch just before the doors open.

“Huh,” he says, and steps out.

Barnes stares after him, black trenchcoat shifting in the currents the Director’s steps create until the elevator doors slide closed.

_Another mission he doesn’t remember? Or something else?_

The elevator slows again three floors up and Barnes braces himself for another visitor. When the door opens, that vaguely familiar smell from earlier hits his nose and that uneasy feeling floods his stomach again. A man steps inside.

“ _Rusted. Longing-_ ”

Barnes’ mind turns to static and then-

His thoughts scatter like crushed birds released on the wind.

“ _Ready to comply,_ ” comes out of his mouth in Russian.

\-----

“Hey, Cap.”

Steve pauses as he looks up, finishes pulling down his shirt. Barton’s standing in the doorway, dirty blonde hair as disheveled as the last time Steve saw him and hands stuffed in his pockets. 

“Barton,” he greets.

“Coffee?” Barton asks.

Steve raises his head in assent, taking one last look around the room to make sure he’s got everything before following Barton out and into the elevator. Barton presses the button for the nearest cafeteria and the ride is quiet on the way down.

Steve gets plain black coffee, and is mildly, almost pleasantly surprised when Barton gets the same. Steve likes the new drinks he’s taste tested off and on, kind of, could do with less sugar, but he’s seen so many people get them. It’s nice to know he’s not the only one who still likes plain and bitter.

They take a seat by the window overlooking the river outside and sip their drinks, mutually ignoring the night scenery. For their jobs, caffeine works best at all hours. Or it would, if it still affected him. Even though the taste isn’t the same as the one from his memory from the war, it’s reminiscent enough that it makes him think of warm memories instead of cold ones, or equally cold reality.

“So...I don’t know if you know,” Barton starts after a couple minutes, eyes out the window and voice hushed but still audible over the background of other agents coming and going and chatting, “But I used to be one of them.”

Steve pauses, frowning. His expression clears when he figures out what ‘them’ is.

“Nat called me about finding you,” Barton continues, “They don’t like me much since I left.” He takes another sip of his coffee, eyes shifting to watch him.

“Why did you leave?” Steve eventually asks. 

Barton taps the side of his cup twice.

“I was born into it,” he starts after a few moments, “Grew up in a circus, did tricks during the shows and hunted with the others late in the night or while we were on the road. After a while, it just...didn’t feel right anymore. But that happens sometimes, when you grow up in something. Sometimes you grow out of it, or just don’t really believe in it anymore.” He gives a small shrug and takes another swallow. “I stopped believing in hunting indiscriminately.”

Steve watches him for a moment before taking a sip of his own. “I didn’t know you grew up in a circus.”

“ _Yeeah_ ,” Barton drawls out, taping his cup once, “Not many people do. It wasn’t the best, but,” he shrugs again, “It was what it was.”

Steve looks down at his cup. “Yeah. I get that.” Kind of. Most of his own childhood is still giant black gaps, but the few pieces he has feel like that. Like he grew up one way, in one, big direction. Guess the star on the shield he carries around is obvious of which way he went, and how hard. “Thanks,” Steve adds, “For risking it to help me.”

Barton raises and taps his cup lightly against Steve’s own, drawing Steve’s eyes up. 

“Hey, no problem, Cap,” Barton replies, adding after a minute, “Are we good? I’ll understand if we’re not.”

Steve’s lips twitch, break the silence in his face. “Yeah,” he says, “We’re good.”

Barton nods, lips curling. They finish the rest of their drinks in companionable silence-

The alarm goes off just as Steve is finishing the dregs and he jerks up, lights switching to flashing red.

“ _Captain Rogers and Strike Team Delta, report to floor forty. Captain Rogers and Strike Team Delta, report to floor forty_ ,” sounds overhead.

Steve glances at Barton and they leave their cups on the table as they run for the stairwell, door banging open and then shut behind them.

“You don’t think it’s the hunters, do you?” Steve asks, keeping pace. He’s got a sinking feeling in his gut; he doesn’t like this.

“Don’t know,” Barton replies, low and clipped. He pulls something out of a thigh holster, unfolding it out into a- Bow? Then pulls something else from the other that snaps together into an arrow. 

Steve kind of wishes he had his shield, but he can’t do anything about that now.

They run up and up, and as soon as they see the painted forty on the wall, they both slow their approach, regulating their breathing and keeping their steps quiet. They reach the door and share a glance and a nod, then Barton palm and retinal scans them in, quietly opening the door.

Steve smells Bucky almost right away and gives Barton a look, who glances back. Steve signs it to him-

He pauses near the end, caught briefly in surprise.

_He knows sign language?_

He finishes it up more jerkily, uncertain, but Barton seem to get the gist and gives a nod, looking back forward. Steve shakes himself back into focus and focuses his hearing, listening for something, anything to tell him what’s going on-

He picks up the familiar sound of nails _clacking_ on hard floor, one set metallic ( _did Bucky shift? Why?)_. He tries to pinpoint where they’re coming from.

They’re steady, sedate, prowling, and it’s coming from... _There_.

Steve signs Barton and they split up, quietly making their ways to converge on the fifth hall down. Bucky will have heard their heartbeats and breathing already, but they can at least try to make it harder for...whatever is going on to happen.

Bucky’s scent grows stronger the closer Steve gets, but there’s something... _off_ about it that Steve can’t put his finger on.

He sees fur around the corner first, hears snuffling. He _painfully_ slowly makes his way further and further around the corner, revealing Bucky inch by inch until Steve can finally see him in his entirety. He’s snuffling at the bottom of a closed door; Steve can hear three heartbeats locked behind it. He glances up when he catches a small movement at the other end of the hall and shares a look with Barton, then slowly steps out from around any cover the corner was giving him.

“Hey, Buck,” Steve hazards, low and gentle. Bucky’s ears twitch as his head snaps up, hackles raising with a low growl. “Come on, Buck,” Steve tries, “It’s me. Steve. Don’t do this to me again.”

Bucky takes one slow, slow step forward, growl still reverberating down the hall’s ribcage.

“ _Buck_ ,” Steve says again, low and warning this time. Bucky’s growling ticks up a notch and Steve holds in a cringe, weighing his options.

He can either try kneeling, submitting, putting him in the perfect position to get his throat torn out, or he can try subduing Bucky like he did the last time in the Tower. Either way, if Steve can’t get through to him and Bucky doesn’t yield, someone, or both of them, is going to get hurt.

The odds of Bucky yielding aren’t too high to begin with, since he’s an alpha. Steve’s still not sure what happened to him, how it affects that side of Bucky, but trying to get him to submit in his current state might just make things worse. He could try reaching Bucky with his own scen-

Bucky charges in the middle of the thought and an arrow hits him in the back of the shoulder. Bucky skids to a stop and whips around, running and baring his teeth at Barton-

Steve’s already moving before he can think about it, tackling Bucky just past the halfway point and they roll, Steve tightening his grip and trying to hold on while Bucky struggles. Bucky’s left arm breaks through his grip and Steve throws a leg up, trapping it, Bucky’s agitated growls rolling through his limbs, his chest.

Barton shifts into his periphery with another arrow and Bucky squirms harder, coarse hair pushing into Steve’s face. _Fuck_ , Steve can feel him slipping out of his _grip_ -

Barton fires another arrow and Bucky doesn’t even jolt, just growls louder, whipping his head around-

Teeth sink into Steve’s arm, sharp and deep, and he yelps- Bucky goes abruptly still.

Barton takes advantage of it and fires another arrow, and Bucky goes back to squirming harder, and just when he’s about to slip Steve’s grip, his movements start to go sluggish. Another minute and they cut out altogether, Bucky’s body going heavy and limp in his arms.

Steve deflates, slowly unwinding his arms and leg as he looks up at Barton.

“That was easier than I thought it’d be,” Barton jokes.

“Speak for yourself,” Steve returns, pushing himself up to his knees. He looks down at Bucky, eyebrows drawn together. “What caused this? The hunters? He was _fine_ earlier.”

Barton frowns down at him too. “I’m not sure.”

Steve looks back up. “But you have an idea,” he says, not asks.

“Maybe,” Barton hedges, lowering his bow and looking towards the locked door. “You got him?” he asks, glancing back.

“Yeah,” Steve sighs, getting to his feet before crouching down and lifting Bucky, the sound of the door opening and relieved chattering a fading background noise to the weight in his arms. He ducks his head down and shoves his face into Bucky’s fur as he heads for the elevator, and tries to make himself believe he’s only doing it to see if he can tell if there’s some detectable reason why he acted the way he did, if there’s anything wrong with Bucky’s scent besides the tinge of fading fear.

\-----

Natasha heads to the server first, ignoring the alarm going off overhead. If this is an internal attack by the hunters, or Hydra, S.H.I.E.L.D.’s confidential files will be the first objective. Or they’re setting bombs, but she can only do so much. 

When she gets there, the servers are intact and the two assigned agents are where they’re supposed to be. She doesn’t bother with them, Hill vetted them herself. If she needs to, she’ll look into them later.

She sprints back down the hall and heads for the stairwell, leaping over the railing and watching the ground rapidly grow close, landing in a crouch at the bottom. She shoves the door open out onto the ground floor and heads for the far east hall. If someone were going to place a bomb, they’d do it at the three main infrastructure points-

She catches whiff of a familiar scent: whiskey, bourbon, metal and gunpowder. It’s not an uncommon combination of smells here, but not common enough that she can’t think of a few people that carry it. But something about the underlying scent always puts her on edge, something more familiar than the smell of gunpowder that it feels like she’s smelt forever. The underlying scent smells both lacking and like it’s there, familiar but-

She follows it down another hall, and another, until the sounds coming from the lobby are faint and distant. When she turns the last corner, there’s a man crouched in front of the far wall at the hall’s end. He goes still.

“I shoulda known you’d find me first,” he says, voice low and scratchy and rough, not pleasant like Barnes’. He stands and turns. “Can’t say I’m surprised. I mighta even been looking forward to it.”

She raises a brow, sneaking a quick look at the bomb behind him, the counter still set at thirty minutes. “Neither can I,” she replies, “Rumlow.”

“Romanoff,” he smirks back, teeth sharp.

Ah. That’s not really surprising, either. No wonder he smelt familiar.

“Shall we get on with it?” he asks, still smirking, and pulls a knife out of a sheath on his belt, “Much as I’d like to draw this out, I don’t got all day.”

She raises her fists, lengthening her nails. “Let’s.”

He grins, excited and cruel, and they charge at each other-

\-----

Steve worries the inside of his lower lip, crossing his arms tighter across his chest while he stares into the room. Barton said the drugs usually last three hours each arrow on a normal person, so nine hours versus their bodies means Bucky shouldn’t be out for more than three. 

Steps.

“Heard your beast ran wild.”

Steve tenses, hackles rising and eyes darting over. The older hunter stops, cane giving a final, _judgemental, thunk_.

“It wasn’t him,” Steve counters, low and firm.

“Oh?” the hunter asks.

Steve doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t want or have to.

He looks back into the room.

“He’s killed a lot of people,” the hunter says.

Steve barely keeps himself from growling when he replies, “That wasn’t him, either.”

“No?”

He feels eyes on him.

“It wasn’t his claws shredding through people like wet paper?”

“That doesn’t mean it was _him_ ,” Steve growls, fists tightening out of sight and gloves creaking faintly.

“Ah, yes. Hydra.”

Steve freezes. He’s vaguely aware of eyes on him again. He glances back with his own wide ones.

“They didn’t tell you yet,” the hunter deduces, “Now you know.”

Steve’s breath catches, gloves _crinkling_ as his fingers curl tighter.

“You died for nothing,” the hunter states, eyes solemn and heavy.

Steve stares back, yanked from the shock for a moment.

“You’re wrong,” he says, swallows when it comes out softer than he’d like, repeats it, stronger, “You’re wrong.”

The hunter watches him.

“I died for him.” Steve nods his head towards the window. The hunter’s eyes don’t leave him until he eventually turns and heads back down the hall the way he came, where Steve’s torturer is waiting at the end of it.

He waits until they’re both out of sight and sound before letting his breath escalate, heart rate picking up quickly like a steam engine. He leans forward on his hand on the window, head dropping, is vaguely aware of the coolness of the glass slowly sinking through his glove.

Hydra. It was _Hydra_. God. _They_ had Bucky, _this whole time_.

Steve bites his lower lip roughly, hard enough to bleed.

He has the most memories of them, of the pain and loss and bloodshed they caused. They- Red Skull, destroyed his hand, then his and Bucky’s lives, then- Apparently just kept doing it these past _seventy years_ -

He can’t breathe.

He drags his head up and looks up into the room, slowly dropping to his knees before turning and sitting on the floor, pressing his back to the wall below the window.

 _What have I done to you?_ Steve thinks desperately, licks the blood from his lower lip and then presses the heels of his palms to his eyes, _What have I done?_

\-----

Steve wakes with a start, sucking in a breath, stares dumbly at the ceiling. He’d woken up the same way yesterday, and the day before, and the day before.

He turns his head and looks to the right.

Bucky’s still asleep on the bed.

Steve had moved into the room, closed the curtains on the window to give them some privacy. The couch isn’t great, but it’s better than the bed he has in his apartment, if a bit small.

He lets out a quiet, relieved breath and watches Bucky, even when his eyelids start drooping and he has to blink them open, until he can’t anymore, until they close.

\--

There’s a small breeze against his skin and then Steve’s awake, but keeps his breathing steady and his eyes closed. He hears a snuffle and feels the breeze again against the side of his neck and realizes it’s breath, Bucky’s scent full in his nose, and keeps himself very still. He wants to shiver, but doesn’t.

After a minute of quiet, he finally slowly opens his eyes and just as slowly turns his head to the right, meets a big black nose that lowers, then gray-blue eyes. Bucky doesn’t growl at him. That’s something. Maybe whatever happened to him wore off.

Bucky’s nose gently nudges his shoulder with a small, quiet, almost-whine and Steve blinks, shakes his head a little both to try and clear it and in reply.

“I’m fine,” he says, lifting his bandaged arm, “I deserve it.”

Bucky makes another, quiet, almost-whine and then starts to shift, the sounds of his bones cracking and realigning loud in the room. Bucky leans up and forward after it’s done, looks like he wants to reach out but doesn’t.

“What did I do?” he asks quietly. 

Steve stares up at him, eyes drawn down to the scar wrapped around his shoulder, the metal going in beneath his skin, or coming out of it. It’s hard to tell.

“You didn’t recognize me,” Steve answers, dragging his eyes away from it, “Like when we first met. But you were sniffing at a locked door with scared agents behind it.” Which is strange. When Bucky was acting like the Winter Soldier before, he’d had a goal in mind: to kill Stark. This just seemed like he was... _roaming_. That and he had shifted. _Why did he shift?_ “What’s the last thing you remember?” Steve asks, looking back up, “What was your mission?”

Bucky’s eyes go far away and Steve waits, not sure if either of them is going to get an answer. After another minute, Bucky’s eyes focus again.

“There was a man,” he starts a little distantly, like he’s remembering, “I didn’t like the way he smelled. He told me to ‘shift and wreak havoc’. There were- he said words-” Bucky cuts off, eyebrows tangling. “He said words and I had to obey.”

Bucky’s breath stutters and Steve’s stomach sinks. He slowly pushes himself up to sit and turns on the couch towards Bucky, legs either side of him. Bucky’s eyes lift up to him, looking adrift. Then something seems to catch his attention and he starts sniffing at the air, dropping his head lower. He his hands settle on and grip Steve’s thighs and then he pushes them apart while Steve lets out a floundering, “ _Buck!_ ” leans in close and practically shoves his face between Steve’s thighs. Steve shoves at his head, trying to push him away. “What are you-”

Bucky goes abruptly still, which makes Steve go abruptly still, hands braced awkwardly on the couch and Bucky’s head, body tense.

“You-” Bucky starts, then cuts off as he jerks his head back, out from under Steve’s hand, staring at where he’d just had his face, “You…” he repeats, sounding stunned, _looking_ stunned.

“Buck…?” Steve swallows, “What is it?” His smell has been just a _little_ off lately, but he’s been stressed, and it was starting to go back to normal. He can’t be sick again, can he-

“Pregnant,” Bucky says, and Steve’s heart skips and stops. Bucky can’t seem to take his eyes away from Steve’s lap. “You were...pregnant.”

 _Were_ -

 _Oh God_.

Steve scrambles up.

He runs for the sink in the corner before dry heaving into it. His body doesn’t have anything to throw up- Oh God, his _body_ -

Steve dry heaves again, hacking twice. He spits into the sink and focuses on turning the water on, on cupping his hands in it and slurping some into his mouth, swishing and spitting. He doesn’t need to, but he repeats it, focuses solely on every action. He shuts the water off and braces his hands on the edge, staring down into the silver basin.

He was...and he didn’t even notice.

He can’t help it, he starts laughing. It feels hysterical, it _is_ hysterical, but once he starts, he can’t seem to _stop_. He laughs so hard his stomach hurts and he gets tears in his eyes, and once those start, they can’t seem to stop either.

“ _I don’t know how much more- I can take_ ,” Steve struggles to get out, leaning heavier and heavier against the edge of the sink while his knees shake and tremble. “ _God_ , that’s not fair to say to you, but I feel like-” He doesn’t finish, bites his lower lip roughly and drops to his knees on the floor instead, pressing his forehead firmly to the cold metal of the sink. “ _I_ -” he chokes out, voice wobbling dangerously.

And what _right_ does he have to break down like this? Bucky was with _Hydra_ for seventy damn years, probably remembers less than he does and has _hunters_ in this building out for his head. Meanwhile, Steve’sfine in comparison, even had sex with Bucky when he _shouldn’t have_. Both of them barely know enough about each other to consent to that, let alone _themselves_. And _now_ , Steve’s- God, what has he _done_.

“ _What have I- done_ ,” Steve sobs, body lurching forward with a jerk, hunching in on himself. All he wanted was his memories back, then Bucky back, but ever since he woke up, he’s been fucking up one thing after another. His past self _couldn’t_ have fucked up this _badly_.

He flinches when fingers touch his shoulder and they skitter away like birds. Steve didn’t even hear Bucky move. He does hear the breaking and cracking, the sounds of Bucky shifting, and then a cold nose presses to the side of his neck and Steve jumps, jerking back and around.

Bucky howls quietly behind his closed mouth, and it sounds so sad and forlorn that it breaks Steve’s heart the rest of the way in half, fragments scattering into his lungs and stealing his air. Steve can’t stand to touch him, but at the same time that’s all he wants. That’s all he _wants_. And he’s so damn _selfish_. He must have been in his past life, too, to feel it so strongly. He could laugh. He hates that about himself, both versions of himself.

After a couple minutes, he opens his arm and Bucky slowly steps forward, front paws either side of his thigh and neck resting heavy on his shoulder. Steve hesitantly wraps his arms around him, slowly tightening his fists in Bucky’s thick fur. The sobs start up again and Steve draws him in as close as he can get, heaving chest hitting the jut of Bucky’s on each sucked in breath.

“ _I’m so sorry_ ,” Steve tries to get out, words getting muffled halfway into Bucky’s fur when he turns his face into it, doesn’t have the right but needs it, “ _I’m so sorry_.”

Bucky just presses closer, chin resting resting heavy over Steve’s shoulder blade, and it just makes him cry harder.

-

Steve eventually quiets down, the fire in Barnes’ own chest banking to something more manageable. Steve cries himself out hard enough that he falls asleep against the sink, his arms gradually slackening until they slide down from around him.

Barnes slowly pulls back to look down at him, then dips his head close to gently lick Steve’s tears away before moving to the other side of the room after to shift, trying to keep it as quiet as possible. Afterwards, he walks back over and crouches down, gets his arms around Steve’s back and under him and lifts, carrying him over and gently setting him down on the bed.

Barnes sits with him, on the edge, carefully brushes Steve’s long, silky bangs away from his face and just watches him, and thinks. He drags his eyes down to Steve’s stomach.

He had a child, _they_ had a child. The loss feels like a hole in his chest that spans back decades. Had he wanted children before the war? Did he want them with Steve? The memories are blurry. They still come in pieces and fragments sometimes, on their own and triggered by things, sounds, smells. Being around Steve makes them come more, sometimes, but none of them are whole. He is a patchwork. And yet, still, even someone like him had…

He wants to reach out and touch, wants to put his hand on Steve’s stomach, even though it’s gone now. His fingers twitch and his hand slowly slides forward on the bed, but he stops, pulls it back. Steve is in enough pain; he doesn’t need to wake him and make it worse.

Steve was pregnant, until recently, otherwise Barnes wouldn’t have been able to pick up on the smell, faint as it was. The torture most have done it, taken it away, or maybe something before that. It’s impossible to know, and Steve didn’t appear to know, either.

His fingers slowly curl into fists.

 _The hunters_. They took Steve to get to him. This is his doing, their doing, and...Hydra’s. If Hydra hadn’t sent him to kill the hunter, they wouldn’t have hunted him so arduously.

His fingers curl tighter, knuckles white.

There’s a familiar scent at the door not too long later, and he gives Steve a longer look before getting up and going to it, opening the door a crack. Romanoff is standing on the other side. She smells of blood that smells familiar.

“I have something for you,” she says, low and quiet, and something in her eyes says that she _knows_ , “Follow, if you want it.”

She turns and starts heading down the hall. He watches her for a moment before looking back at Steve, watches him even longer and then turns back around, slipping silently out of the room. 

He doesn’t bother with clothes, let people see him as he is, follows Romanoff into the elevator and watches her smooth, shiny fingernail as she presses a button for a sub-level floor. This could be a trick, to get him locked up, caged again to be someone’s pet, but the blood smells too familiar for that. There is no one but Steve who is familiar in this place, and it’s not Steve’s.

The elevator stops three times, and every time, the agents intending to board take one look at him and back up, the doors sliding closed again. He and Romanoff keep heading down, just the two of them, until they finally reach the end of the line ( _something...clicks, somewhere in his head at the thought. He files it away for later_ ). The doors slide open and he follows her down the brightly lit, steel gray hall. The smell of the familiar blood is stronger down here, and he feels like he can almost place it-

She stops and palms, codes, and retinal scans open a door on the right halfway down the hall, and that blood smell floods his nose.

There’s a man sitting in a chair in the middle of the room, wrists and ankles bolted to the arms and legs of it, covered head to toe in varying gashes and blood, red splattered on the floor, a couple streaks, dark red and shining under the light, decorating the gray walls. The man drags his dark haired head up, just enough to look at them with the eye that isn’t gouged out, then lifts his head up and drops it back with a choked, rough laugh.

“Gonna put on a show for me?” he grins, half garbled from his ruined tongue and teeth sharp, what’s left of them.

Romanoff looks to Barnes and gestures to the man and room as a whole, then steps back to lean against the corner, crossing her arms.

“Gonna vent?” the man taunts, still grinning, “I only had you cause a _little_ havoc.” The man spits out a wad of blood and spit before grinning again.

 _A jester_ , Barnes thinks suddenly, _A liar_.

It slams into him then. 

This is the man who triggered him, the man that was part of his guard when he was with Hydra, when he was sitting in the Chair, the one who always watched him. This man is Hydra.

Barnes moves before he realizes it, stops in front of him when the man laughs.

“Oooh, big bad asset,” the man tries to stay, stumbling over the words a bit, “You that pissed about a few random S.H.I.E.L.D. lackies? Unless…” The man gets a glint in his eye and his smirk curves up into feral, one eye glowing amber. “You realized that bitch Captain was carrying.” 

Barnes doesn’t move and the man’s mouth stretches wider to show more teeth and gaps. 

“Too bad,” he croons, “Say, maybe I should knock him up instead. A hybrid and a pure wolf, goin’ at it like rabbits. I’d even let you watch.” He tilts his head to the side, smirking, cruel. “Oh, the brats we’d make. I think he’d even like it.” His smirk sharpens. “He certainly liked _your_ cock.” His eye slowly lowers to it, then back up.

Barnes keeps himself very still, ignoring the memories trying to press in on all sides. He learned early on that torture is about power and control, and he is not willing to give this man any more.

“Bet he’d moan real pretty for me, like he did for you. Suck cock, too, mouth like that,” the man continues, raising a brow, “I’ve never fucked a guy before, but his body works different, don’t it. I saw the footage of you two.”

Barnes just keeps watching him and the man just keeps smirking.

“You are nothing,” Barnes states.

“Oh?” the man asks, “How’s that? I set out and did everything I planned to, unlike you. _And_ I got the bonus of scarring you _and_ your bitch for life. Kinda funny, since you were Hydra’s bitch, too,” he laughs.

“I saw you,” Barnes says.

The man pauses.

Barnes stares down at him, can feel his eyes glowing hot. “You wanted what I was: the Chair, the tube.” He lifts his left hand and curls his fingers into a fist, uncurls them and lengthens them to claws. “The power.”

The man’s smirk slowly fades, eye focused on him.

“The lineage,” Barnes continues, “To be full, instead of a crossbreed mutt. Steve. You want everything you will never have. You haven’t accomplished anything.”

The man grinds his teeth. Another loosens and falls out. His face is growing red beneath all the cuts and blood.

“You will never be more than canonfodder for an outdated, failing cause,” Barnes says, low and deadly soft, “I don’t even remember your name, and neither will Steve, or Hydra, or anyone else.”

The man opens his mouth as he jerks forward against his restraints. “ _Rum_ -”

Bucky darts his left hand out and grabs hold of the man’s bottom jaw and _rips_ it out, blood splattering him, the room. He tosses it aside and rips the man’s throat out in quick succession, then stabs his hand through the bloody, wet mess of it until his fingers touch bone, wraps them around it and _yanks_ -

He tosses the vertebrae and ligaments aside while the man stares, eye wide, hears the bone hit pavement while blood spurts and pours out of the man’s throat and down his chest in a stream, soaking through his clothes, pooling on the floor, and slowly encroaching across the distance until it touches Barnes’ toes, melts around them around to slowly outline his feet. He watches until the man’s eye is lifeless, then longer still, until he feels the blood around his feet start to cool.

“Good thing you didn’t wear clothes,” Romanoff says dryly. He turns to look at her. She pushes herself up out of the corner and heads for the door. “Shower’s this way. Don’t need to bother Steve with the smell of _disgruntled, dead lowlife_.”

She’s right.

Barnes follows.

The sooner the smell is gone, the sooner the man fades away into nothing forever, where he belongs, and the sooner Barnes can get back to Steve.


	17. Father of monsters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you Kay for betaing and the nifty gem of an idea for a scene in this chapter. 8D

Steve shifts a little, turns his face further into the good, warm and safe smell. It’s always made him feel safer, ever since he was a kid.

He feels the bed dip and sighs.

“Five more minutes, Ma,” he mumbles, burying his face further into the pillow. Fingers lightly brush through his hair and he sighs again, sinking back under. 

He wakes again later, doesn’t know how long, and this time everything comes crashing back in. Steve stills, breath catching, and keeps his eyes closed, curling his fingers into the sheets drawn up around him. Someone must have done it while he was sleeping, and it smells like…

Reluctantly, he unburies his face and turns to look. Bucky’s sitting on the edge of the bed, staring out at the room. He looks over after Steve does, and Steve’s eyes start stinging. He squeezes them shut, then opens them, and forces himself to sit up.

“What’s going on?” he asks quietly.

“They’re getting ready to start the mission,” Bucky answers, and Steve’s throat goes tight. He scents the room. “I didn’t let anyone in,” Bucky says, and it’s dumb, maybe, but it puts Steve a little at ease. “I’m leaving soon,” Bucky adds, which makes Steve tense all over again, “I didn’t want to wake you.”

“I’m up now,” Steve says. 

Bucky watches him. “You’re not coming with me,“ he says, and Steve frowns.

“I-”

“They want you with the second unit,” Bucky continues, “You will move in once I have located the Hydra heads or hybrids inside.”

“They’re using you as bait,” Steve bites.

“Yes,” Bucky answers calmly.

“They want you dead, Buck,” Steve warns.

“They do,” Bucky agrees, so damn calm; it’s frustrating, “But I want to live.”

“You can’t guarantee that you _will_ ,” Steve argues, “I just got you _back_.”

Bucky’s eyes soften slightly. “I’m not Bucky.”

“And I’m not Steve,” Steve counters, “Doesn’t change anything.”

“You love Bucky,” Bucky says, frowning slightly.

“I love whoever you’ve become,” Steve replies, “Whatever you are.”

Bucky just watches him, and it’s still frustrating.

“You don’t think it’s real?” Steve demands, “That it doesn’t matter to me?”

“I don’t know,” Bucky says after a moment, standing. Steve shifts and does the same.

“What do you...want to be called?” he asks, _tries_.

Bucky pauses, studying him. After a moment, he looks down. “I was using ‘Barnes’, but…”

“But?” Steve prompts, when he doesn’t continue.

“I like the way you call me ‘Bucky’,” he finishes, looking back up. He doesn’t blush, but it looks a little like he wants to.

“Barnes,” Steve says, taking a step closer with it, “Bucky,” another, “Buck,” until they’re inches apart, “Winter Soldier.” Bucky’s back straightens as his eyes focus. “This feeling’s not going away no matter what I call you, no matter what either of us remembers or doesn’t. I don’t want it to,” Steve continues, voice growing stronger, “Accept it or don’t, you don’t have to love me back, but don’t tell me how I feel.”

Bucky watches him, or Barnes, or the Winter Soldier, Steve doesn’t know, but it feels like he’s always watching him, studying and parsing and deciphering. Steve’s not sure what he sees, but he feels like a broken mess.

“I won’t,” Bucky says eventually, “Never again.”

Steve’s lips twitch faintly. “Never?” he tries teasing, but it falls mostly flat on its face.

Bucky leans a little closer, tips of their noses barely brushing. “Never,” he promises in a whisper.

Steve tilts his head closer, feels Bucky’s breath brush his lips-

The door opens, and he could throw the whole damn bed _and_ the couch _at the same time_.

“Oops,” Romanoff says, not sounding sorry at all, lips curled up like a cheshire, “I’m interrupting.”

Steve slants his eyes in her direction but she just keeps smiling, a little smug, a lot pleased.

“We’re getting ready to move out,” she says, “I need loverboy.”

Bucky mutters something in Russian that makes her eyes light up like a Christmas tree, but moves for the door.

“What am I supposed to do?” Steve asks as he watches them both go, keeps the _frantic_ out of his voice, or tries.

“You’re moving with squad two, so go get ready,” Romanoff answers on her way out the door. Bucky gives him one last look before following.

Steve walks to the door, watches him until he disappears around the corner and then glances back into the room to take one last look: the sink, the bed, the couch, swallowing down all the memories and emotions trying to unfurl in rapid succession in his chest and closing the door behind him, heading the other direction.

\-----

He pulls the needle out with a sigh, looking up through the slim gap between the stall door and wall when the main bathroom door opens, capping the needle and slipping it into his pocket, rolling down his sleeve. He stands and unlocks the stall door, pushing it open and heading for the sink. The faucet is motion activated, how futuristic.

“Should you be doing it here?” Janae asks after he’s stepped closer, keeping his voice hushed underneath the sound of the water. Rheighan activates it again when it shuts off.

“It’s fine,” he replies.

“Did you have enough?” Janae asks, eyebrows drawn together.

“Enough,” Rheighan answers and agrees, walking over to grab a paper towel, “I won’t live forever, boy.” Janae’s steps follow his out the door and out into the hall where Keith stands, pushing up off the wall as soon as he hears them.

“We’re going,” Keith reports quietly.

“Out of this den of snakes and into another,” Janae snips. Keith’s eyebrows pull together, keeping pace with them.

“They’re not all bad.” He hunches in a little. 

Janae’s eyes narrow across at him. “Met a boy?”

Keith looks away.

“A girl?”

Ducks his head.

“Look, but-”

“‘Don’t touch’. I know,” Keith finishes for him, “I won’t.”

“Just reminding,” Janae says.

They’re ‘escorted’ to the hangar, then the jet, where a red haired woman is waiting. Keith stares for a few seconds too long before ducking his head and looking away, cheeks red. 

The woman smirks. 

“Hello, boys,” she greets, smooth and rolling, “I’ll be your pilot and mediator. Take a seat and strap in.”

They follow her up the ramp, looking around as they do. They settle on three seats a few away from the cockpit where she goes. Janae sweeps his eyes around again as the engines start up, the _hum_ vibrating up through their bones. It’s dim, shadows sharp and angled along the hull, straps and thick nets and equipment lining the walls.

“Where’s-” he starts.

The three of them look over when they catch movement, all stilling.

The metal armed wolf walks up the ramp, steps inaudible. He takes a seat on the opposite side of the jet closer to the middle, buckling himself in and then closing his eyes. Janae grits his teeth while Rheighan and Keith just watch him, buckling themselves in before the back hatch closes and the jet starts rolling across the tarmac. Light starts filtering in from above in the cockpit area with a heavy _grind_ of metal from outside the jet’s walls.

“ _I wish you nightmares, bastard wolf_ ,” Janae mutters. 

The wolf doesn’t give any indication that he heard him.

\-----

Steve settles his uniform in place, tightening the harness straps before reaching for his shield, bringing it around into place between his shoulderblades. He grabs his helmet before banging his locker closed.

“You two will be joining me in squad two,” Hill’s voice carries and accompanies her long stridden steps. Steve glances at Barton before quickly hurrying to follow. “Alpha S.T.R.I.K.E. will be accompanying us on the mission. We’ll only step in once we have confirmation of the Heads of Hydra or the hybrids, understood?” she asks, leading the way to the hangar.

“What if squad one is in danger?” Steve asks, since he can’t just ask about _Bucky_ , buckling his helmet into place while following Clint up the ramp into the quinjet. The red and green lights highlight the sharp, streamline angles of Hill in the dim, fading into her dark skin. Clint continues on through to the cockpit (and _out_ of the line of fire)

“Heads of Hydra or hybrids only,” she annunciates slow and firm, “ _Understood?_ ”

Steve grits his teeth, ignoring the bustle of the S.T.R.I.K.E. team boarding and settling in around him.

“Yes, ma’am,” he answers. She turns sharply and takes the copilot seat while Steve tries to swallow down his frustration and worry, and finds his own seat, strapping himself in.

\-----

They land an hour later in what appears to be the forest surrounding the border of New York, a reservation of some sort. The red haired woman pulls her headset off and walks into the back area they’re in as they all unbuckle.

“Now,” she starts, walking over to the wolf while pulling a small...bandage out of her pocket, “This is a monitoring device. Undetectable. Hard to replace. Think of it as the world’s smallest camera,” she explains, ripping the packaging open and pulling out a thin, transparent little squire. She reaches up and adheres it to the wolf’s skin, just to the side of his adam’s apple with steady fingertips. “We know a guy,” she says, “But you break it? You owe S.H.I.E.L.D. thirty million. So don’t.”

The wolf just watches her while her lips quirk.

“You’ll go inside like you’re turning yourself in,” she explains, “As soon as we have visual or audio confirmation of the Hydra head, heads, or hybrid experiments, we’ll move in with squad two right behind us. We’re your first response team.” She gestures back at the hunters and the wolf glances up. “Any questions?”

The wolf is quiet for a moment. 

“If I forget,” he starts softly, eyes intent on hers, “Don’t let me hurt him.”

Her expression softens faintly and she reaches up to touch his cheek. It feels intimate, but the hunters keep watching.

“ _I don’t want to forget_ ,” they hear him whisper in Russian.

“ _I’ll make sure you know him again, if you do_ ,” she replies in kind. The wolf swallows a little but nods, and she lowers her hand, turning to encompass the hunters as well. “Ready?”

The three of them nod and she opens the back hatch. They all watch the wolf exit down the ramp and around the corner, out of sight. She moves over to turn on a monitor and the screen fills with the forest outside from the camera view on the wolf’s neck, bobbing gently with his steps.

Rheighan takes a slow, steady breath, glancing back at the worried look Keith’s giving the side of his face. “Worried for him?” he asks.

“Worried for all of us,” Keith replies.

“Worry too _much_ ,” Janea snips in quietly.

“Or just enough,” Keith mutters, giving him a look.

“Here we go, boys,” the woman says after a few minutes, and they all turn their heads back up to the screen. 

A small building steadily comes into view between the trees and the wolf’s steps slow. It looks more like an outhouse than a nazi base. The door is pulled open and the wolf steps inside, then it goes dark. It lasts all of thirty seconds before there’s a bright light from the bottom that slowly moves up. The view tilts up a little with it and then the light steadily moves back down, settling at the floor. They hear a _click-hiss_ and then the walls start panning up, the wolf moving down.

“Elevator,” the woman observes, “That’s going to be interesting.” It’ll either be extremely convenient, or extremely _in_ convenient. She doesn’t think there will be a middle. Hill should be scanning for alternate entrances soon, though, so hopefully that will make the results end more in their favor.

Everything goes black on screen save for the faint glow of light consistently coming from below. Natasha counts the seconds until it starts to increase. The light keeps increasing until the walls finally give way to a long, large white room, Hydra agents all around with guns pointed at them.

“Not a welcome reception,” Keith whispers.

“ _Hold_ ,” one of the agents orders. The wolf doesn’t move. “ _Report status_.”

“ _In need of maintenance and debrief_ ,” the wolf answers, low and steady. The agent that spoke watches him critically for a minute and then nods to some others, who move in with batons, the rest of the agent’s guns still trained. They swing the batons and the wolf jerks with a low grunt, almost buried under the sound of electricity. He falls to a knee with another jerk, then to his face with three more, the whole screen briefly taken up by the gray floor. He comes up from the ground and they can see again, legs either side of the camera as the agents hold him up. The one that spoke steps forward and they see his left leg kick out, the view jerking sharply.

“ _Bring him to the chamber_ ,” the agent orders, “ _The Secretary will want words with him._ ”

Natasha’s eyes narrow fractionally.

They start dragging the wolf further into the room.

\-----

Steve tries to keep his foot from tapping, tries to focus on the urge instead of the memories attempting to swell with the emotions in his chest, his head. It’s so hard not to think about- _everything_. It doesn’t take them that long to get there, logically he knows this, but it feels like an eternity before the wheels finally hit the ground, forest green filling the cockpit windows.

Hill pulls her headset off and steps out of the cockpit, turning the nearest monitor on. Legs fill the screen and then one lifts and the view jerks, and then someone’s talking.

“He’s in,” she observes, and Steve’s stomach drops out. She pulls a device out of her belt and presses a button on it. “Scanning for entrances and exits.”

 _Bucky_ , Steve thinks desperately, gloved fingers curling tight against the tops of his thighs and eyes glued to the screen.

Clint steps out of the cockpit and takes the seat at his left. It’s a small comfort.

\-----

Bucky keeps his eyes open and aware of the feeling of the patch on his skin, tries to keep his head up enough without drawing attention to it. They drag him down three halls, all with closed doors before finally entering a room. He sees the Chair in the corner and wants to shudder and throw up. He does neither. They drop and shove him into the cement. He knows better than to stand, but pushes himself up to sit, and listens. He counts the seconds as they tick by while he listens to the guards and tries not to think, _memories_ and _feelings_ pushing at his walls again. He thinks it might have made this easier if he didn’t feel anything, if he didn’t remember anything. He thinks maybe he sometimes wishes he didn’t.

It takes two minutes and forty seconds before he hears sedate steps that send a shiver up his spine. The guards go quiet as soon as the steps enter the room and he looks up. The steps stop. The man pulls over a stool and sits five feet away, lacing his fingers between his thighs.

“Well,” the man starts casually, “If it isn’t our lost asset.” He’s older than the hunter out in the quinjet, hair graying to white, the blonde vibrant, dyed into strands that have aged. His face is lined in wrinkles, is familiar in ways Barnes both doesn’t and does want to think about. “What made him come back, I wonder?”

They’d talked about this, before he’d boarded the jet at S.H.I.E.L.D., but he answers honestly all the same. It turns out he needed the man’s name, after all.

“Rumlow,” he answers quietly. It grates.

“Ah, yes,” the man says, “You did a number on him, I hear, after Agent Romanoff.” Barnes keeps quiet at that. “But he achieved his objective.” The man eases back a bit. “Here you are. Now.” He leans back forward against the low and urgent, “ _Secretary Pierce,_ ”s from a few of the surrounding agents. Pierce waves them off. “Tell me why you came back.”

Barnes pauses and lowers his eyes. It’s quiet. “Rogers,” he near whispers, confesses.

“Ah,” Pierce says softly, “I hear he’s not quite who he used to be.”

Barnes nods. “I’m not...I’m not Bucky,” he says quietly.

“No,” Pierce agrees gently, “You haven’t been for some time.”

Barnes lowers his head a little. “He thinks...I’m enough?” he says, but it comes out like a question, “He thinks he wants me.”

“But he doesn’t, not really,” Pierce replies, still gentle, “He never will. He can’t understand what you are. He isn’t Hydra.”

Bucky grits his sharpened teeth, feels like his chest is caving in. He nods, fingers curling against the cold cement.

“Welcome home,” Pierce says, and the asset drags his eyes back up, staring longingly.

 _Please say the words_ , he thinks.

“Our fist of Hydra.”

He shudders minutely, eyes slipping closed.

“You know, it’s ironic, since Rumlow came from you.”

He tenses, eyes opening and staring up at him again. 

Pierce smiles. “Would you like to see?” he asks, standing from the stool, and waits. After a moment, Barnes slowly pushes himself up off the floor. He glances briefly at the guards and follows Pierce out the door.

\-----

They go down a series of halls that Steve has a hard time keeping track of, but he tries. Eventually, the man, ‘Director Pierce’, stops in front of a set of double doors and leans in close to the right of one, lifting his glasses to scan his eye. There’s a metallic _click_ and then a light on the scanner switches from red to green. He opens the door with an almost _gentle_ smile and leads the way inside, the camera following.

Steve tries to focus on the white surroundings, the details of the room, the paths of halls they took to get there instead of Pierce’s words, bouncing around like rabid ping pong balls inside his skull, hitting his thoughts and memories and emotions with a ruthless sort of accuracy.

He shakes his head a little and tries to focus (he _tries_ ).

His eyes flash, sitting on the edge of his seat. It’s easier focusing on how much he wants to tear the man’s face off, gloved fingers flexing on top of his thighs.

\-----

Barnes follows him in, looking around. Everywhere is white: the floor, the walls, ceiling, tables, computers. Lab technicians in white coats turn to look at him, eyes above their white surgical masks nearly pinning him in place with a shudder. He keeps walking. A man slips in through the double doors at the other end of the room, coat billowing out behind him as he quickly makes his way to them.

“Secretary. I wasn’t expecting you,” he says hurriedly as he comes to a stop, gaze shifting to him, “And…”

“I thought I’d give a brief tour,” Pierce returns pleasantly. 

There’s eyes on them, so many eyes.

“Are you sure that’s…” the man trails off, swallowing when Pierce just keeps smiling, “Yes, sir. This way.” He gestures an arm out before leading the way down across the room to the doors he came through at the end, retinal scanning them in, too. He holds open one of the doors. Pierce gestures out with his arm this time, looking to Barnes, and Barnes glances at him before slowly stepping forward.

“Welcome to your legacy,” Pierce says.

\-----

The three of them stare as they take in the tubes, more revealed when the wolf slowly pans his head left, then right. Some of the...people in them, if you could call them that, look normal at first glance, but then you look _closer_.

They’re all variations of grotesque, monster esque, malformed variations of the same thing, floating lifeless in faintly glowing green liquid, large container tubes tall and proud on display. Some are more human than wolf, and others are more wolf than human. One’s teeth don’t fit his face, are too big, overlapping and protruding while his eyes stare out, unseeing, arms too long and feet too narrow to be human, but aren’t quite shaped like a wolf’s. Another’s head is half morphed, muzzle protruding and incomplete. Her hands are half formed claws and her chest has bulged out, stomach unnaturally concave but smooth skin instead of fur until her thighs and biceps. It’s all more of the same and the man is still talking.

\-----

“Do you know how difficult it is to make a werewolf?” Pierce asks, barely dragging Barnes out of his thoughts, eyes still wide and staring up. “It’s like...trying to mix water and oil. Test tube grown and even through more organic means, the brands of genetics just refuse to merge, for the most part.” 

Barnes’ eyes slowly shift, taking them all in again.

“Eventually, we found a common gene among our hybrid successes,” Pierce continues, oblivious or uncaring of the now-wasteland of Barnes’ mind, his thoughts, “But it took us some time. We couldn’t have done it without you. Using your DNA. You could say, all of them, the failures and the successes, are your children.”

Barnes freezes, eyes dragging to him. Pierce looks to him, thoughtful. 

“I was saddened to hear about the loss of Roger’s pregnancy.”

Barnes stares.

“But pleased to learn that he’s capable. You can’t understand how difficult it’s been, looking for pure wolves these past few years,” Pierce continues blithely, “The population’s thinning, or they’ve gone into hiding because of the hunters, or both. The ones Hydra managed to catch early on were a dime a dozen, and didn’t last very long in the early experiments, learning about what you could and couldn’t do. We’ve managed to stretch out their runtime, sort-to-say. But you and Rogers, what you can both create, you are _quite_ valuable. It won’t be anything like these here.” 

He nods his chin towards the rows of tubes. 

“Nothing like these, no. You will both make something perfect, the perfect soldier, raised by Hydra from birth,” he says, sounds like he’s picturing it, “Maybe then we can better find the secret to how it is achieved, and the longevity,” he adds, “Like we couldn’t risk with you.”

Barnes can’t stop staring at him.

Pierce smiles, pleased. “Our own ‘father of monsters’.”

An alarm goes off overhead, then the sound of gunfire a few halls ahead, jerking Barnes out of his thoughts, or lack of them. The guns the agents had been twitchy about being able to aim at him now jerk up to aim past him and then he hears it, a scream- no, a growl? Some inhuman mix of both that sends the hair at the base of his neck standing on end, goosebumps prickling up his forearms. It wails like it’s dying and angry all at once, screaming with loud, violent _bangs_ and _crashes_ amid the yelling of the dying, of gunfire overlapping gunfire. 

The doors burst and bang open at the other end of the room and- _it_ comes running, loping awkwardly on all fours, half of its fingers human and the other half malformed claws, face mostly wolf and the rest some distorted remnants of human clawing for place in the gnash of stretched skin and fading fur, stomach unnaturally concave like some of the others in the tubes, chest protruding out somewhere between human and beast. Fur fades up from its feet, over its calves to its knees. It runs straight for them as it screams again, spit and blood flecking its teeth and running down its lower jaw, down its chin, hitting the floor as it aims straight for them. Barnes thinks it might have been a woman, once-

He bares his teeth and runs at it, skimming past Pierce. Their claws hit and he grapples with it, trying to avoid its jaws snapping at his face and _twists_ \- He throws it into one of the tubes with a _crash_ of shattering glass, faintly glowing green water flooding across the pristine white floor. The body inside the tube drops with a sickly wet _thud_ to the ground with the one that’s _not_ dead. It curves up, growling, then screams again as it tries to run, scrambling and slipping in the water, messy and uncoordinated. Barnes seizes the opportunity and runs over, skidding to a stop at its side as he gets his arms around its throat and _twists_ sharply-

The scream cuts off with a _crack_ , short and abrupt. The silence is deafening.

Barnes pants, staring down at it with wide eyes. He slowly uncoils his arms from around its neck, jerks his head up when he hears clapping.

Pierce’s hands meet over and over and over, almost hypnotic in the shock.

Barnes should tear his throat out, he should break all ten of his fingers and shred his face to _pieces_ , but-

But the asset doesn’t move, the asset doesn’t think it can move, even when another alarm goes off and Pierce sighs.

“Sputnik,” he says, and both the asset and Barnes drop, hears “ _Take him_ ,” from what seems like underwater.

\-----

Steve fights his way through the facility, taking every Hydra agent in his path down harder than he needs to, uses all of the emotions he can’t fully suppress without thinking about them more than surfacely. Even if he only used a _fraction_ of what he’s felt over the past few days, they’d still go down hard, cracked teeth and skulls alike.

He tries to keep track of his team even though all he wants to do is _find Bucky_ and get his claws in Pierce, but things get confused in the flurry of battle and he loses track. He takes advantage of it and tries to trace Bucky’s steps from what he saw on the camera, latching onto his scent in the mess of _sweat_ and _emotions_ and _gunfire_ like a bloodhound and tracks it. He hears shots a few halls up ahead and takes off. _That’s promising_.

It takes him too long to get to the hall for his liking, but eventually he hears a rough voice say, “ _That’s ours_ ,” and sprints in the direction.

As soon as Steve sees Bucky down, held up by the two younger hunters surrounded by Hydra agents, the oldest hunter with a gun pointed in Pierce’s face, Steve throws his shield and causes chaos. It’s his best bet of getting Bucky _out_ of it.

Guns go off, too many to bother counting. Steve grabs Bucky when the chance presents itself and shoves the two hunters away in the confusion, shoving Bucky down underneath one of the nearest tables and settling his shield over his head and upper half. He turns and enters back into the fray, baring his teeth at the Hydra agents and avoiding Pierce. As much as he wants to put his claws through his face, they need him alive, for now. So he keeps his claws and teeth off of him and sticks to tripping him up in the middle of his attempted escape instead, the gun fire gradually petering off between them. There’s a familiar _click_ behind Steve as soon as everything is still.

“We’ll be taking the wolf,” the oldest hunter says.

“I can’t let you,” Steve replies, slowly turning around. Now there’s a gun pointed at _his_ face, but what else is new.

“You don’t have your shield to hide behind now, Captain,” the hunter says.

“You think I need it?” Steve almost growls back. The two younger hunters pull out their own guns, pointing them at him. “It _wasn’t him_ ,” Steve adds, pointing at Pierce, “And _he_ can prove it.”

The older hunter considers this. After a long, tense minute, he slowly lowers his gun, the other two following, one more reluctantly than the other.

“ _Rheighan_ ,” the second oldest barks.

The older hunter- Rheighan, glances back. “I have my reasons,” is all he says. The second oldest bristles while the youngest glances between them.

Steve moves to handcuff Pierce, then heads back over to check on Bucky, kneeling down at his side. “Bucky?” he asks softly, reaching out to shake his shoulder, touch his cheek, “ _Barnes_.” 

Nothing.

Steve’s eyebrows tangle up.

\-----

Hill pulls out her phone, hitting speed dial and bringing it up to her ear. “Sir,” she says when the line clicks open on the other end. She glances down at the S.T.R.I.K.E. member bleeding out underneath her boot, red spreading out across the white floor. “It’s done.”

“ _Very good_ ,” Fury replies. 

The line disconnects and she ends the call on her side, pocketing her phone.

One less snake nest to worry about.


	18. We've gotta get out of this place if it's the last thing, we ever do

He stares at the footage on the tablet, the large tubes from the Hydra base panning across the screen as the camera moves, S.H.I.E.L.D. agents flitting about like worker bees trying to uncover Hydra’s dirty secrets, his _blood’s_ dirty secrets. Rheighan’s skulking around in the back, looking over files before sidestepping to a computer. The camera moves further into the lab, taking him out of frame, further and further back. There’s a green glow coming from the back wall and Steve squints, trying to make out what it is until he doesn’t have to try at all, can see row upon row of small tubes, much smaller than the ones at the front of the lab, and they’re not empty.

Steve lowers the tablet to his lap and looks up across the room, closing his eyes and then squeezing them shut while he tries to take a full, deep breath. It hitches and he clears his throat quietly, shaking his head a little and pinching the bridge of his nose. He lowers his hand and looks over at Bucky, still asleep on the bed from yesterday, and it’s both a little easier to breathe, a little harder.

He takes a deep breath and angles the tablet up again, dropping his eyes back to it.

\-----

Another hour goes by and Bucky still hasn’t woken. The doctors said he was stable, that his pupils dilated in reaction to light, it was just...they said, “The lights are on but nobody’s home.” Steve’s reluctant to leave him. With the hunters still in the building, Fury’s interest in the Winter Soldier, Hill’s distrust, and not knowing what Pierce actually _did_ to Bucky, it doesn’t feel safe to leave him. Which is exactly when Fury requests him, and by ‘requests’, Fury actually means _expects_.

Steve looks at Bucky one more time before very reluctantly standing from the side of the bed and heading for the door. He pauses when he pulls it open, Romanoff already on the other side of it.

“I’ll watch him,” she says. It seems too convenient to be true, but he doesn’t have much choice in the matter.

“Stay outside the room?” he asks, unmoving.

She quirks a brow. “Sure.”

“I mean it,” Steve insists, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice, expression.

Her lips curl like it’s a game. “Alright.”

Steve’s not sure if he should trust her, but she steps aside and he steps out, closing the door behind him, watching her the whole time before he heads down the hall. When he pushes the door open to Fury’s office a few minutes and an elevator ride later, he can smell the hunters, even more strongly than the lazing trail in the hall.

“Captain Rogers,” Fury greets as he looks up from an open file on his desk, closing it. Steve only catches a few of the faded numbers on the front and some Russian Cyrillic.

Steve comes to a stop at the front of Fury’s desk. This meeting feels serious, final, a fork in the road that they each need to choose a path on.

“Take a seat,” Fury says.

Like all things today, Steve reluctantly does.

Fury looks at him, studies him, lacing his fingers over the top of what Steve knows is the Winter Soldier file. The seconds tick by in silence under his enigmatic gaze.

“We need to talk about the Winter Soldier,” Fury finally says.

“Barnes,” Steve cuts in, “He goes by Barnes.”

Fury doesn’t say anything to that, doesn’t even twitch an eyebrow up at the interruption.

“You want him,” Steve states, trying to cut to the chase. Fury continues to watch him, as unreadable as ever. “The hunters want him. Hydra wants him. I want him. I think he even wants himself.” Steve glances down at the file, eyes tracing the worn edges, the faded ink. It’s a physical copy of the digital one he was shown at the start of all this, most likely, and it doesn’t look like a reproduced copy. He wonders how Fury got it, _when_ he got it, if it came from the Hydra base.

Fury slowly sits back. “I can’t let him run free,” he finally says, “He’s dangerous and, like you said, wanted. So. What are we going to do?”

“You won’t put him in my charge?” Steve asks, trying, and restraining all of his anxiety, the desperation leaking out from gaps in his aching chest, wounds and scars ready to spread open wide and take him away with them.

“Can you promise he’ll stay on base?” Fury returns.

Steve pauses. “I was thinking about taking some vacation time,” he returns, thinks Fury’s already aware of his intentions. It wouldn’t be surprising, at this point. “I think I need it, and I think he does, too.”

Fury leans back a little further in his chair, slumping into the black leather. The silence just makes Steve more antsy, the longer he’s sitting here and Bucky’s unconscious and alone. He tries to keep it to himself, like everything else. What’s one more thing.

It feels like an impossible situation. Steve’s one step away from walking out the door and just _taking_ Bucky, but he doesn’t...want to force Bucky, either. He’s had enough of that going on the past seventy years and couple days, too.

“If he works for S.H.I.E.L.D., we can better protect him from Hydra and the hunters,” Fury eventually says, “He’ll have a place here, to live and work. He won’t be able to leave the base outside of missions and observed free time, but he’ll be as free as he’s ever going to get.”

Steve bristles. “You’re talking about him like he doesn’t get a _choice_ ,” he grits, fingers curling into fists on top of his thighs, “He’s paid his dues.”

“He’s lucky he’s not being tried and hung as a global terrorist,” Fury replies.

Steve feels his teeth elongate and breathes in slowly through his nose. “He didn’t have a choice.”

“Doesn’t matter; he still did it,” Fury returns.

“That wasn’t his _call_ ,” Steve stresses, “He remembers even less than _I_ do.”

“Which just makes him more dangerous.” Fury finally raises a brow.

“That’s _bullshit_ and you and I know it,” Steve growls.

“ _Doesn’t matter_ ,” Fury emphasizes, giving him a look, “His freedom is not on the table. It’s a foregone conclusion. We did not put all this work into getting him here just so he could run off and potentially snap at someone when he’s triggered.”

Steve cuts off a growl low in his throat, then pauses, the words slowly sinking in. Something doesn’t fit. “‘All this work to get him here’?” he asks.

Fury pauses minutely, but Steve can see it a mile off, an alarm distantly going off in his head.

Fury sent him after Bucky to protect Stark, that’s how this all started. Fury met and agreed to work with the hunters after Steve was...taken, and Romanoff showed up with S.H.I.E.L.D. and Bucky to rescue him-

Wait.

Sharon Carter. And Romanoff showed up with Bucky after Steve was taken.

His eyes widen a little. Everything going on and he never really got the chance to look at all the _pieces_. They don’t match.

“What was Carter doing with the hunters?” Steve asks. _Why was she there_.

“I had her infiltrate as a triple agent,” Fury replies steadily, but Steve can hear his heart tick up, just a little. A little is a _mile_ for someone like Fury.

Carter was already with the hunters by the time Steve got there. Romanoff showed up with Bucky. It makes sense they’d show up together if Romanoff found him, but Carter disappeared during the raid, at least Steve thinks she did. He wasn’t in the state to keep track of her. But Romanoff-

“ _Rogers_ -”

Steve’s eyebrows tangle.

Romanoff showed up with Bucky. Why is that _bothering_ him?

 

_“ **Ruler of the Nine Realms speaking**.”_

_Steve snorts. “I think Thor might take issue with that statement,” he tries to joke._

_“ **Eh. Wouldn’t be the first time I angered a god. What’s up? Your voice sounds like a kid riding a bike for the first time. And by that, I mean not good. Just to be clear. Have you ever seen a kid try to ride a bike for the first time? Catastrophe.** ”_

_Steve tightens his hand on his phone. “A friend called,” he makes himself say, “Hasn’t seen our friend yet.”_

_“ **Ah** ,” Tony replies, “ **Well, going by reputation, our friend will find something.**”_

_Steve stares straight ahead, barely sees the other people on the street and picks up the pace. “I don’t know,” he says quietly._

_“ **Hey, what did I tell you? If our friend and I am looking, not to mention Jarvis. You’re welcome**,” he adds away from the phone, presumably to Jarvis, “ **Between the three of us, we’ll find something. Take a breath, Rogers.** ”_

_Steve blows out the one he’d been holding and forces himself to take another._

_“ **Just keep that up, and come over if you can’t,** ” Tony says, “ **Now. What’d you buy? Anything good?** ”_

 

Steve straightens sharply in his chair, eyes a little wide.

Romanoff could have found Bucky in the time between when Steve was taken and when they showed up to rescue him, but Carter was already undercover and Romanoff and Bucky showed up _with_ S.H.I.E.L.D., which means they took time to contact S.H.I.E.L.D. and coordinate a rescue, which cuts down the amount of time she would have had to find Bucky, then _somehow_ get him to _listen_ to her, which means-

Romanoff had already found Bucky _before_ she’d called Steve the night he was taken? He was gone barely a _day_ -

 _Carter was already undercover_ , he thinks, the thought rippling out into black nothing, _Romanoff had already found Bucky and **lied** to him_. That means-

“You used me as bait,” Steve stays faintly, “You used me as bait to get Bucky _and_ the hunters.”

Fury stares at him, eye widened fractionally. The sound of his heartbeat has increased a little more.

“What else were you lying about?” Steve asks distantly.

“Rogers,” Fury starts, steady and firm.

Steve snaps. “ _What else?!_ ” he shouts, jerking up from his chair.

Fury goes silent and tense for a few moments. Then he sighs, long and weary. “I wanted to use _him_ to find the hunters and Hydra,” he explains, “I sent Romanoff to apply pressure on the hunters to force them to act while Carter delivered you to the hunters as her way in. I didn’t expect Romanoff to find him first-”

Steve jerks back a bit. “You...you made me lose…”

Fury just stares at him heavily and Steve grits his teeth, feels the pressure build against his jaw so much he thinks they might chip. He lurches forward sharply and Fury flinches faintly when Steve slams his hands on top of his desk, glass cracking under his palms.

 _“I’m taking Bucky and we’re leaving_ ,” he growls out low.

Fury’s mouth drops open a fraction. “Now wait a-”

“ _YOU TOOK OUR CHILD_ ,” Steve yells, and Fury goes quiet, “You owe me more than you can repay,” he finishes, deadly low, “I’m going on vacation, and I’m taking Bucky with me. If you try to stop either of us, if you try to drag us back in, Banner won’t be the only one whose anger you’ll need to watch out for.” He pushes off of Fury’s desk and heads for the door, Fury standing from his chair in his periphery.

“Are you coming back?” Fury asks, voice steady.

“I don’t know,” Steve growls, pulling the door open sharply and slamming it behind him so hard he hears the door and frame crack.

 _ **I need to get out of here**_ , he thinks wildly, thoughts full of deafening static.

\-----

“Secretary Pierce.”

He smiles back serenely.

Hill keeps her stoic stillness. “S.H.I.E.L.D. is currently combing through your Hydra base, home, office. Would you care to save us time by enlightening us on why the Secretary of Defense is working for Hydra?”

“For?” Pierce asks, “Or with?”

“Either,” Hill replies smoothly.

“What do you think of the world, Agent Hill?” he asks. She doesn’t say a word, twitch a muscle. “It’s in disarray. We put scattered toys back in their boxes, the rowdy children in a semi-permanent time out, but nothing ever really gets better. The weapons change, the methods vary, but we’re all still vying and clawing for the right to be on top.”

She watches him.

“People are trampled on, the weak are cast aside, even those with potential or gifts for seeing the world for what it is, or what it could be, are crushed under heel,” he continues, “There are so many needless deaths, impossible numbers of them. And what is the world doing to stop it?” He studies her. “S.H.I.E.L.D., the C.I.A., the F.B.I., covert ops programs and the more public facade of the military. But what have any of them accomplished, really? In the long run.”

She keeps quiet, lets him run his mouth.

“You send your agents out on missions, one after another. How many times have you sent them out to fix something you’d just taken care of not too long beforehand?” he asks, “I’ve seen the reports. You put the Avengers together to handle the Invasion, but you’ll send Rogers out on another mission within a week, maybe less. You’re only treating the symptoms.”

“And what’s the disease?” she asks.

“Disorder,” Pierce answers, “Chaos. That Norse god had it half right, humanity is in need of subjugation, a guiding fist. Herd the rebellious, the tyrannical, the terrorists to the slaughter so that the rest may live out their lives in peace. So S.H.I.E.L.D.,” he adds, gaze sharpening, “And the Avengers, no longer need to exist.”

Hill gives it thirty seconds before asking, “Who else shares this view?”

Pierce relaxes again, not exactly good for interrogation. “Come, now,” he says, smiling again, “I won’t make it that easy.”

“Even if we freeze all of your assets?” she asks. But he doesn’t budge. She changes the subject. “Let’s talk about Barnes.”

The hunters watch from behind the other side of the viewing window, listening over the speakers.

“ _The Winter Soldier_ ,” the woman adds from the other side of the glass.

“ _Hydra’s fist_ ,” the man replies, “ _A fine weapon_.”

“ _A presumed dead Sergeant_ ,” she quips.

“ _Something like that_ ,” the man smiles.

“ _Inhuman_ ,” the woman states.

“ _I wouldn’t quite put it that way_ ,” the man replies, calmly lacing his fingers together on top of the metal table.

“ _How did you get him to cooperate?_ ” she asks.

“ _Electroshock_ ,” the man answers easily, “ _A combination of drugs in a steady drip fed into his system, certain methods of deprivation and sensory training, and two to ten long years to ripen him to perfection_.”

The woman watches the man for a few moments. “ _You’re saying all this freely_.”

“ _I’m just curious_ ,” the man replies, still smiling faintly, calm, “ _What you’ll do with the information. If S.H.I.E.L.D. will utilize our greatest asset, or let him go to waste chasing memory_.”

Janae’s eyes narrow.

“Captain America was telling the truth,” Keith says quietly, trying to keep the ‘ _I told you so_ ’ out of his voice.

“Doesn’t change anything,” Janae replies, bitter and quiet.

“And then what?” Keith asks after a moment, “What is after he is dead?”

“You already know,” Janae replies, “We go back to how we were, away from all…” he gestures a little with a hand, “This.”

Keith glances at him out of the corner of his eye and keeps himself from turning away from the window. Janae will know.

\-----

When Steve gets back to the room and gets the door open, Romanoff is lounging on the couch with a tablet. She lifts her head to raise a playful brow at him.

“I need you to leave,” he says, trying to regulate his breathing. She lowers the tablet and stands, studying him. “ _Now_.” She goes, thankfully, quiet and without a word. As soon as the door’s shut and the sounds of her footsteps have faded, Steve pulls in a ragged breath before trying to settle it back down.

 _Not here_ , he thinks desperately, moving over to drop slightly on the edge of the bed Bucky’s still laying in, _Not yet_. He looks down at Bucky-

Who slowly opens his eyes and looks back.

Steve blinks.

It’s quiet for a minute, just their breathing, then Bucky eventually asks quietly, “Did S.H.I.E.L.D. get Hydra?”

“Yes,” Steve answers, just as quiet, everything else momentarily swallowed down in the face of- “You’re awake.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything to that, just slowly sits up. Steve scoots back a little to give him some space.

It’s quiet again. Steve tries to keep his leg from bouncing.

“Buck,” he eventually blurts quietly, “I need to leave. Will you come with me?”

Bucky stares at him blankly.

“I can’t stand being here anymore,” Steve confesses in a whisper.

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a few moments. Then, finally, “I thought I couldn’t leave.”

“I talked with Fury,” Steve replies, “You can leave whenever you want.”

It’s quiet. Bucky doesn’t say anything again, just stares blankly out at the room and Steve tries not to fidget. It’s getting harder and _harder_. Finally, he can’t take it anymore and lurches to his feet.

“I need to go,” he blurts again, and Bucky blinks, looking up at him, “Are you coming?”

“I…” Bucky trails off. Steve’s fingers curl and uncurl over and over and over while he tries not to jitter in place.

“I don’t want to tell you what to do,” he says when Bucky doesn’t continue, “But I don’t want to leave you here. But I also can’t-...I can’t be here another minute.” He bends forward, leaning on his hands on the bed to get close enough to whisper in Bucky’s ear, leaning forward a little more when Bucky instinctually leans back. After he’s done, Steve pulls back and stands up, staring at Bucky and trying to hide how... _forlorn_ he feels.

Bucky stares back, eyes wide, and Steve tries to swallow past his closing throat.

“Please think about it,” he says, then makes himself turn around and head to the door, stopping to stare at Bucky one more time because it might be the last. Then he goes, closing the door quietly behind him and heading for the locker room. He needs to change out of his uniform and put his shield in its bag, get his bike in the S.H.I.E.L.D. parking garage, maybe stop at his apartment before he gets out of the city.

-

Steve stops long enough to pack some things, uses all his frenetic, nervous energy to grab a duffel out of his closet and stuff it with clothes, his toothbrush, toothpaste, hairbrush, q-tips, some of the books he’s collected, cash he’s stashed around various parts of the apartment, any food that he can fit in that doesn’t need to be refrigerated. He stuffs protein packs and bars in any outside pockets he can cram them in, granola and dried packs of berries that Tony made him take when Steve last visited the Tower, those small packs of cookies Carter bought him that she liked to snack on-

He stops and shakes his head, scattering the thought away, and zips up all of the pockets on the bag before he shoulders it across his chest, over the one containing his shield. He heads for the door, stopping to take one last look around this place that was never home before closing and locking the door behind him, quickly heading down the stairs and out the front door. He yanks the duffel strap down his front until the bag rests at his lower back, then climbs on his motorcycle and starts it, out in under ten. Steve looks around as he pulls out, checking for any S.H.I.E.L.D. standard surveillance cars, pedestrians, _hunters_ on the way to Roosevelt Bridge.

The evening rush is still going, so Steve eases up on the throttle and lets his bike coast along. By the time he reaches the bridge, the traffic is still there, but it’s starting to thin. Crossing the bridge doesn’t take too long, and Steve keeps going ten more miles out before flicking his turn signal on and drifting out of the far lane to the side of the road, kicking up dirt and rocks as he slows to a stop in the grass. He plants his feet and cuts the engine, kicking the kickstand out and leaning the bike left until the stand takes the weight. He climbs off, keeping his back to the roads, and looks through the trees to the water, D.C. even further.

He shoves his hands in his pockets and waits, watching the sun as it sets, blinding gold stretching its fingers out across the land and making him squint.

He listens to the cars, hears the way they thicken and thin, coming and going. People going into D.C., people leaving it, people passing through. The smell of the water drifts up on the breeze, rustling the trees with it, and Steve can smell sewage, the human stench polluting the scent. It makes his nose wrinkle, and he tries to focus on the sound of the leaves brushing together in the wind instead while also keeping an ear out for any approaching vehicles.

The sun’s just started sinking below the horizon when he hears a motorcycle engine slow, and Steve turns a little to look, raising a hand to try and block the sunlight as he hears gravel kick up, kicking his heart up with it, then the sound going muffled as the wheels slow to a stop on the grass next to his bike. The engine idles for a moment before cutting out, the rider covered in black leather kicking out the stand and easing the bike down to the side to rest on it before climbing off and walking forward, reaching up to take his helmet off and reveal his face.

“ _Buck_ ,” Steve breathes, breathless for more than one reason, cheeks warming, because he _came_ , but also…”You look-”

He’s chopped most of his hair off, bangs a little jagged and flyaway in the breeze, lifting and brushing his scruffy cheeks. It’s shorter in the back, but still flares out, longer on the top and then longest at his bangs. The leather jacket looks new, so do the black pants and the black shirt, the black gloves and helmet.

Bucky slows to a stop a couple feet away and just looks at him, helmet resting between his hands where his fingers tense briefly. “I will be harder to find now,” he says quietly, but Steve can hear him over the cars passing twenty feet away.

They watch each other.

“I wasn’t sure if...you were going to come,” Steve says quietly, pushing his hands a little deeper into his pockets.

Bucky’s eyes and expression soften, a little heartbroken. He shifts his helmet and offers out a hand, and Steve pulls out one of his own and slowly, hesitantly takes it. Bucky’s fingers tighten around his and tug him forward. Steve lets himself move.

Bucky leans closer rubs their cheeks together, the rough brush of his scruff sending little shivers down Steve’s spine and Steve lets his eyes close, rubbing his scent on Bucky back.

“Let’s go?” Bucky asks, pulling back a little. Steve nods, that nervous energy he had finally starting to unwind a bit. Bucky leads them back to the motorcycles, only letting go of his hand when they have to climb back on. Steve glances over.

“No one’s going to miss that, right?” he asks, looking up from the black motorcycle to Bucky. It looks new, too.

His cheeks warm.

Bucky looks good on it.

Bucky’s lips twitch up slightly. “Maybe a little,” he says, before pushing his helmet back on and taking his little smile with it. Steve misses it already.

He starts his bike and then pauses when Bucky holds something out in his periphery, looking over. Steve blushes and ducks his head a little, accepting the helmet and pulling it down over his head. Less bugs, and less chances of being caught on a camera.

Steve puts his bike in gear and leads them back out onto the road, quickly putting D.C. behind them as they pick up speed.

\-----

 _Steve leans forward and whispers,_ “ _Fury used me as bait and it took our child. I can’t trust anyone here. I’m leaving. Please meet me ten miles out of Roosevelt Bridge on the side of the road if you want to come. Please_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, my greatest weakness is hot biker Bucky on a motorcycle.


	19. Ghost love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soft times

They ride side by side through Virginia into Tennessee before Steve finally caves and signals Bucky to pull over on an upcoming off-road. His hands have been shaking for the past half hour, getting worse and worse the further they go, and he needs to _stop_.

He keeps going another half mile down the road before finally skidding to a halt, kicking up gravel, and shutting off the engine. He barely gets the kickstand out and off his bike, his bags discarded and helmet yanked off his head before he tosses it as he drops to his knees and lets out the scream that’s been building inside of him for the past day and a half. Birds skitter out of nearby trees, fly up into the night sky to join and blot the stars and Steve shoves his fingers into his hair, pulling and tugging on it while he shakes, yelling again before the sound gets overtaken by sobs.

He doesn’t hear Bucky come around until there’s fingers on his shoulder, then Steve’s being pulled in and he wraps his arms around Bucky tight, burying his sobs in his shoulder, the scent of new leather everywhere. It’s comforting though, having Bucky around him, holding him, _here_ , and he thinks he feels Bucky shake, too.

After they’ve settled down and Steve’s sniffled his way back to semi-stable on his feet, they ride back out onto the road, pulling off at the second off ramp’s sign that offers a motel. Bucky pays while Steve waits in the wings, hat pulled on out of his duffel and pulled low to block most of his face. They push their bikes and park them in front of their room, Steve keeping watch while Bucky moves ahead and gets the door open.

Steve drops his bags by the small table near the door then crawls onto the nearest bed, curling up in the middle. He doesn’t bother changing, showering, eating; he just wants to _sleep_.

\-----

He’s slow to wake, groggy for the first time in- he can’t remember. He doesn’t open his eyes right away when it slowly filters in that he doesn’t _have_ to, and tries to ignore all the rest of it, doesn’t push the thoughts still buffering at his mind from a great, long distance. Yesterday helped, finally letting himself break into a million pieces. It doesn’t fix anything, but it helped. He still doesn’t want the memories or thoughts, though, so he tries to stop thinking about them altogether, and when they start to press in, Steve focuses on his surroundings.

The bed smells like cleaning chemicals and him and leather. There’s a dog barking about a mile away, birds chirping in the trees just outside, a car pulling out of the parking lot beyond the dirty, curtain covered window. His mouth is dry and stale, like he’s slept with it open-

He slowly closes it, running his tongue around and trying to build up some saliva to get rid of the _dry_. 

The best thing he smells, though, is _Bucky_ , the rain and stone and ice that comprises his scent. It’s mingled with Steve’s own, and makes him feel good to smell it that way; he likes it.

After another minute of pretending not to be awake, Steve cracks his eyes open- 

And startles, blinking.

Bucky’s staring at him from ten inches away, all morning (or afternoon) soft and stupidly beautiful. Steve doesn’t date, hasn’t been trying to, and he hasn’t really noticed anyone outside of an almost artistic interest, but Bucky is breathtaking, all dark hair, pale skin, ice blue eyes. Steve wonders if he’s always been (going off of the black and white photos Steve saw after waking, he has).

Steve stares at him and Bucky stares back. He distantly thinks maybe he should say something, break the silence, but it’s too calming to, too comfortable, and Bucky doesn’t look like he’s in a rush to break it either.

It continues to be quiet for the next hour, Steve drifting in and out of a doze under Bucky’s gaze. It’s the most peaceful he’s felt since he can remember, in any of what he can remember. He doesn’t want it to end, even though there’s piranha’s snapping away in the waters of his mind, attempting to nip his heels and pull the tarp off of memories and emotions and thoughts he doesn’t want to face. 

_Just a little longer_ , he thinks, _Just let me have this a little longer_.

\--

‘A little longer’ eventually comes to an end, like all things, and Steve wakes up for good as the sun sets, paints the room a dim gold that refracts muffled in Bucky’s reflective, gray-blue eyes. Steve watches Bucky watch him, listening to the ways their breaths mingle and their hearts intertwine, beat for every steady beat, the noise of the rest of the world far away, beyond the walls and windows of their temporary sanctuary.

Steve shifts a little to pull his gloves off, setting them aside before curling up again. “What do you remember?” he whispers, honestly wants to know. Bucky watches him while he thinks.

“Snow,” he starts slowly, soft and quiet, almost a whisper, like they’re children up late who should be sleeping, “Ice, cold, pain, so much of it, I’d feel it even when it wasn’t there.” Steve listens closely, soaks up every word because he’s starving for it, even though his mind conjures all sorts of images at once, but none of them are probably true. It’s not really a comfort. “But…” Bucky trails off, and Steve waits patiently, “There are warm memories now, pieces, of you.”

Steve slides his hand across the inches and miles between them, flattens the mountains and valleys in the comforter to loop his pinky over the top of Bucky’s gloved, metal one. It’s harder than bone, even beneath the softness of the leather. “I barely remember you,” Steve confesses, almost a whisper now, too, “But I feel like I’ve known you as long as I was asleep.”

Bucky rubs their fingers together. “I feel the same,” he replies. Steve’s chest warms in a pleasant way, like the sun cresting the horizon at dawn, washing his insides in warm hues. His toes curl in his shoes. He hopes Bucky feels as warmly as he does.

They lay there for the rest of the evening, only getting up in the dark to use the restroom before curling back up on the bed, facing each other and linked by a minimally momentous point of contact. Bucky took his gloves off; Steve traces the metal ridges with an elongated fingertip. Bucky’s eyes watch it, then he finally catches Steve’s finger gently with his own.

“This hurt you,” Bucky says quietly, and Steve nods, “I didn’t...get there in time.”

“You did,” Steve replies, cheeks warming when Bucky pulls his hand up to his lips, pressing them lightly to the malformed bones, the incorrectly healed breaks. “I don’t remember much of what happened after, but you saved me from-...from ending up like those ones in the tubes in that Hydra lab.” Bucky stills and Steve regrets the words, but doesn’t want to pull them back in. They’re out in the world, and Bucky seems to have been avoiding it all as much as Steve has.

“You heard,” Bucky says to the dark, not a question. 

Steve nods anyway. “I did,” he replies.

“My…” 

Steve hears him swallow. Bucky doesn’t finish. Steve turns his ruined hand in Bucky’s metal one and holds it, ruin in ruin.

Bucky’s offspring, of a sort. Some of them were probably born to surrogates, others were probably regular people to begin with. Either way, it was Bucky’s D.N.A. Hyda used, Bucky’s body they violated to make...those things, dying creatures who never had a chance.

Steve doesn’t say anything, because there’s nothing he can think of _to_ say. It’d left him speechless then, and it leaves him speechless now. Hydra as a whole is still out there, Pierce’s base can’t be the only one in existence; that’s not how Hydra operates, apparently. It’s like a disease, a virus, spreading and consuming until there’s nothing left. Easy to manifest, hard to destroy. Steve wants to crush it under his heel and burn the remnants, but that’s easier to think than do, and he’s so tired.

“To hell with the world,” he thinks aloud in a whisper, “I just want to protect you and...maybe live this life I have, now.”

Bucky drags his eyes up at that, watching him. “And not get answers?” he asks. Steve drops his own eyes to their hands, shifts his and slots his fingers between Bucky’s.

Steve doesn’t know. He feels like a newborn, _tabula rasa_ , in this life. Everything from _before_ is so...clouded and blurry, a lot of it not even there at all. He recovered what he could, but nothing new has really come since. He’s not holding out a lot of hope for any more returning.

He bends forward to press his own lips to Bucky’s hand, the metal of it just a little cooler than room temperature, enough to _feel_ it against his lips, breath gently fogging the metal. He lifts his head and looks at Bucky, and they stay that way until Steve falls asleep, just watching each other, two lonely stars glowing softly in the dark.

\-----

Steve has another breakdown thirty miles outside of Tennessee. He barely gets off his bike and gets his bags off quick enough before the shaking drags him to his knees. He doesn’t scream this time, so the sound of a yell jerks him around sharply in the middle of a sob, wet eyes wide.

Bucky’s yelling up at the sky, fists clenched tight enough at his sides that Steve can hear the leather creak. When he stops, the sound echoes out against the trees and surrounding mountains, out of the valley. Steve rubs his tears away with a gloved palm and forces himself to his feet. Bucky’s chest heaves once, twice, then Steve sees his teeth grit and matching wetness slide down his cheeks.

Steve seeks him out, barely brushes his fingers against Bucky’s gloved knuckles and Bucky slowly crumples forward with something like a faint, whimper-whine, burying his face in Steve’s neck while his hands come up and grip the back of Steve’s jacket. 

Bucky’s shaking all over, as bad as Steve was, and Steve grips him tight. They shake apart together, two mountains crumbling like falling rocks.

Steve thinks he sees snow falling out of the corner of his eyes, and shuts them to it.

\-----

Steve was afforded seventy years of back pay since his status had never been changed from M.I.A. to K.I.A. when he went down with the Valkyrie. Apparently Howard Stark, Tony’s father, had spent years searching for him, and Peggy Carter never let him be entirely lost and forgotten.

He uses that back pay to pay for the hotel rooms they book in a zigzag across the country: Tennessee to Kentucky, Illinois to Missouri to Arkansas, Mississippi to Louisiana. He watches the clouds roll warm across the dying summer sky, painted purple and pink like cotton candy at a fair. He can almost smell the sugar and hear the laughter amidst the sound and smell of the tall grass and forest lining trees swaying in the warm breeze.

Bucky comes up behind him slowly; Steve can tell Bucky’s making sure he can hear him. Arms come just as slowly around his waist as Bucky’s chest comes to rest up against his back, chin settling over his shoulder. Bucky’s been slow to approach him since Tennessee, like he thinks Steve will push him away for showing emotions, outrage, anguish, but every time Steve doesn’t-

Bucky slowly rubs their cheeks together and Steve closes his eyes, rubbing back, Bucky’s stubble grown out enough that it’s softer now.

Every time Steve doesn’t, Bucky scent marks him a little more, and it feels good, like Steve belongs. He wonders if it makes Bucky feel like he belongs, too.

\-----

“What do you remember?” Bucky asks, low and quiet in South Dakota, curled around his back in the morning sun. He sounds the most calm Steve’s heard him since everything began.

Steve gently catches and plays with Bucky’s fingers, slowly tangles and untangles them, traces over the top of Bucky’s knuckle with his mottled fingers. Bucky’s are surprisingly smooth, even though Steve imagines he’s punched more people in his lifetime than Steve cares to count, fired a gun more times than Steve wants him to think about. The sun makes his fingers glow, though, like they belong to something divine, heavenly, gentle orange around the edges.

“Pain, mostly,” Steve answers softly, “I remember my ma passing, my lungs nearly giving out some time later, Red Skull disfiguring my hand, and you coming for me.” He taps Bucky’s knuckle twice, light, then draws a sharpened fingernail even lighter up to the next one, then curves it down and around to Bucky’s thumb. “I remember drowning, the pressure on my lungs,” Steve continues, “Cracking my ribs.” 

Bucky’s fingers shift and slowly slot between his, curl tight. Steve appreciates the comfort of it. He couldn’t bring himself to accept it from anyone at S.H.I.E.L.D. who tried, who saw his charts from the defrosting and knew, the therapists that were informed. 

“There’s part of a memory that isn’t bad,” Steve adds, “You and me and the Howling Commandos smoking around a campfire in the forest after the sun has gone behind the mountains, turned everything blue and made the end of the cigarette look like a tiny emergency light flaring at the end of your mouth. I couldn’t hold the smoke in. It made me cough.”

It’s quiet for a minute. Steve focuses on the feel of Bucky’s chest brushing his back every time Bucky inhales, Bucky’s equally steady and rhythmic breath against the back of his head.

“I wanted to get you asthma cigarettes,” Bucky says. Steve pauses. “Could never afford them. I’m glad I couldn’t, now.”

Steve untangles their fingers after a few minutes and stretches his arm out, rolling away and up onto his stomach with a sigh so he can reach his coat where he’d dropped it on the floor earlier, rummaging in the pockets. He pulls out his pack of cigarettes, then digs into his jean pockets for a lighter. 

He shakes a cigarette out, puts it between his lips and flicks the lighter on, leaning his face down closer to light it, turning it into a little emergency light. He breathes in the smoke then pulls the cigarette out of his mouth, setting the lighter down and exhaling smoke into the air before offering the cigarette over to Bucky.

Bucky watches him for a few moments before rolling up onto his own stomach, accepting the cigarette from him and taking a pull. He gives it back and Steve leans over as he takes it, presses their lips together and breathing in as Bucky slowly breathes out, eyes slipping shut and relishing the feel of Bucky’s chapped lips against his, combined with the burn of the smoke going down his throat into his lungs. He pulls back, exhaling.

“I can breathe them now,” Steve says softly. Bucky leans over as he reaches up, cupping the back of Steve’s head as he kisses him, smoke drifting up lazily into the sunbeams of light stretched out across the floor and turning their fingertips gold.

\-----

“We would go on double dates,” Bucky says, wrapped around his back again in a motel in Kansas, rain pattering against the windows. Steve watches the rainstorm from the bed while he listens. “I wanted to dance with you. We used to at your place, then never again after you turned sixteen.”

Steve strokes the back of Bucky’s hands laced at the front of his waist. “I don’t remember it,” he says quietly.

“You had two left feet,” Bucky says, just as soft, “Couldn’t carry a tune with your body or your voice.”

It’s quiet for a beat of lightning and thunder.

“Dugan tried to teach you, so you could dance with Carter,” Bucky continues, “Then the rest of the guys joined in and you never got to, said you still owed her a dance.”

There’s nothing. Nothing comes to mind. Nothing new about Peggy Carter, nothing new about himself or even Bucky, this time. It’s a void.

“Sounds important,” Steve comments, low and quiet, closing his eyes briefly when lips press to his shoulder. “I don’t remember,” he repeats, “They said I probably wouldn’t. This is me...from now on.” He’s not sure if he’s okay with that, but a big part of him is just…

Tired, tired of trying to be Steve Rogers, Captain America, tired of trying to be someone he can’t remember outside of the pain he went through, the aches in his bones and joints, the excruciating pain of growing faster than his body wanted to all in one shot, one foot up and one foot out each side, it feels like. The only things he remembers from being small is his mother dying, getting his teeth kicked in but nothing outside of the action itself, the remembered sensation of his whole body aching and in pain, of his lungs trying to give out on the rest of his body. He can’t even really recall the war, felt like a fraud when reporters tried to come up and ask him about it after the Invasion. _That wasn’t me_ , he wanted to say, _I don’t remember. I don’t deserve the praise, and I can’t answer the questions_. Who praises anyone for killing another human being, remembered or not.

Steve shifts, turns his back on the storm to face Bucky, eyes shifting between his. They match the storm outside, all gray skies and crystallized rain. Steve slowly leans in and Bucky meets him in the middle, lips brushing soft. Steve presses a little more and Bucky’s breath _sighs_ warm across his face, fingers sliding up into the back of his hair and Steve shudders, shiver jittering down his spine. He traces his fingers down Bucky’s arm and Bucky’s fingers slide out of his hair to hold his hand, gripped between their chests while they get lost in the feel of each other’s lips and tongues.

\-----

They pass a month that way, a month of peace and quiet and the sound of Bucky’s breathing, of his heart beating calm and steady without hunters or S.H.I.E.L.D. or Hydra to make it escalate into fear and anxiety. Summer is dying, the heat clinging in some of the states they meander into, dissipating quicker in others. Bucky’s memories have been slowly coming back, trickling in like a stopped up faucet, and he tells Steve about them, the pieces and the ones that finally become whole. They’re not all there, and Steve can’t remember them for himself, but Bucky tells them like stories, some sort of longing tinging his voice. 

Steve listens, he listens patiently, he listens raptly, he listens to them like they’re bedtime stories. But sometimes, he doesn’t want to listen at all.

\-----

The clouds are rolling across the mountains like children kicking thunder, the sound of it cracking and echoing across the valley, sending the hair on the back of Steve’s neck standing on end. Bucky slows his bike down and Steve eases off the throttle to stay with him, follows him off the empty road into long grass, stopping just past the edge of the trees that cover the start of the mountain slope. The sun was already hidden away by the mountains, but now it’s even colder under the shade of the trees.

Bucky slows to a stop and Steve follows suit, parking his bike next to Bucky’s. He kills the engine and pulls his helmet off, and Bucky stares into the forest while Steve tries to be patient. There’s no breeze here, but the smell of the forest is abundant, the smell of the cold. It’s refreshing.

“I remembered being on a mission on a mountain in winter,” Bucky says softly, “I fell of a train into the snow.” 

Steve looks over.

He remembers that, vaguely. It’s mostly impressions of fighting something bright blue while the ground jerked and rocked back and forth beneath him. Then the sound of Bucky’s scream fading and expanding the whole growing in Steve’s chest with every foot he fell further away, until it was as gaping as the ravine below him.

“Before that,” Bucky continues, dragging Steve out of his reverie, “We were camping in the forest with the guys at the base of a mountain. It was freezing, before I really knew what freezing felt like. I shoved my cold fingers under your armpits and you squealed before you could stop yourself.” Bucky laughs quietly and Steve’s left speechless, continues to be when he sees Bucky _smiling_ , not wide, but there all the same.

Bucky looks over at him, helmet between his hands. 

“You chased me around the camp while the guys jeered and laugh,” he says, “Gave me a noogie so bad my hair stuck up in every direction. We all laughed.” Bucky looks down at the ground, at his helmet. “I haven’t laughed in a long time.”

“Me neither,” Steve agrees. He didn’t laugh with S.H.I.E.L.D. or the Avengers, not even with the supposed ‘love of his life’ Peggy Carter. He’s not sure he remembers how. Maybe his body will, if the time comes.

They stay there a little longer, watching the trees, Steve watching Bucky. Only two cars pass by before they head back to the road, continuing west.

\-----

Steve tosses his shirt and kicks out of his jeans to shift, then _runs_ , taking off through the trees. He hears Bucky almost a second later and then they’re weaving through the trees together, eighteen again in a new century. He remembers Bucky getting shot while they were doing this once, his mother, but even with the risks, he feels truly free-

Bucky weaves around Steve, sees blond in his periphery and his heart leaps. Finally, _finally_ he’s running with his mirror. His tail tries to wag while he’s running and when he looks over, it looks like Steve’s giving him a wolf grin.

\--

They stop in a clearing two hours later, out of breath but feeling a good kind of exertion. Bucky flops down gracelessly in the moonlight and rolls, rubbing his back into the grass and flattening it. He bumps into something and rolls up, tongue lolling when he sees Steve.

Steve rubs his muzzle into the side of Bucky’s neck and Bucky licks his ear, both their tails flopping happily against the ground. They rub their muzzles together, nestling up side by side and soaking in each other’s warmth while they bath in the moonlight.

\--

“I had a good time last night,” Steve says the next morning. The smile feels foreign on his face, but it’s there all the same.

“Me too,” Bucky replies, coming up and wrapping an arm around his waist, chest pressing into his shoulder as he leans in to press a kiss to the corner of Steve’s mouth. “Next full moon?” he asks.

Steve’s smile widens. “Next full moon,” he agrees, and for once, it feels like Hydra and S.H.I.E.L.D. never existed.

\-----

They stop in Connecticut and take a week to look around before shooting down to Alabama, and then all away across to Washington. They race each other on their bikes across the country, zip down deserted back road stretches and empty highways, grinning beneath their helmets while they weave around each other with tires instead of paws. It’s fun, actually _fun_. Steve can’t remember ever having fun.

Once they hit Washington, they stay for three days, then ride down to Oregon, then up to Idaho, where they settle in for a week, and a carnival.

\-----

“Remember when I made you ride The Cyclone at Coney Island?” Bucky asks, smiling a bit up at the bulletin board in the hotel lobby.

“No,” Steve answers, looking up at it too.

Bucky’s grin is slow and... _mischievous_ , when the silence goes on and Steve looks over. “There’s one the next town over.”

Steve drops his head back, slanting his eyes over at him. “A carnival?”

“A fair,” Bucky corrects, pointing at the flyer on the bulletin board before taking hold of Steve’s hand and asking almost hesitantly, “Can we?”

Steve’s lips twitch, tightening his grip. “Yeah.”

\--

“You blew thirty bucks trying to win me a bear,” Steve says. He’s not sure how to feel about it, but his chest is warm and he can’t help smiling.

“And I _got it_ ,” Bucky smirks a little, brandishing it in all its soft brown glory.

Steve huffs a laugh and accepts it, holding it close, gripping Bucky’s hand when Bucky reaches for him and letting Bucky lead him to the Ferris Wheel. He stares up at it. It’s...oddly daunting, in a way.

“You want to?” he asks, looking over at Bucky, and Bucky smiles a little back, nodding.

The man controlling the ride gives them a small, odd look when it’s their turn to step on, and the kids at their back make Steve feel out of place, but Bucky leads him on like any of them are only there in his periphery, aware of them but nothing beyond that. Steve envies him that, even while it’s humbling. Bucky’s been through so much, but he can pretend no one’s there and just enjoy himself. Steve, on the other hand, has felt like he’s been in a display case since he got up, stared at, gawked at, asked questions that sound like riddles he can’t wrap his head around, and stared at expectantly while countless people wait for their show. So it’s nice, when he steps into the cage and locks the door behind them, and the world fades as the ride slowly takes them further and further away from the ground, Bucky’s hand warm and solid in his, even through their gloves.

The sun has gone down by the time they reach the top for the first time, and Steve stares out with Bucky at the world, pressed shoulder to shoulder, all along their sides. Bucky’s warm. It’s...relaxing.

Steve lowers his head and rests his chin on top of the stuffed bear, eyes drooping a little. 

“I don’t remember doing this before,” Bucky say, soft and quiet, and there’s a spark of relief in Steve’s chest. “Do you?” Bucky asks, dragging his eyes over to him. Steve shakes his head.

“First time for us both,” he says, giving Bucky’s hand a squeeze. Bucky’s lips curve up. His smiles are small, but Steve’s always warmed to see them, new as they are. He thinks he would be even if they weren’t.

They meld slowly forward, curve into each other like two bending willows, and their lips meet at the top of the wheel, town lights sprawled below and a peaceful silence ringing out in Steve’s chest, his head, everywhere he exists.


	20. Swept away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little bit shorter chapter this time since it was initially part of the previous, but I thought a bit of a 'time gap' would work better between the two.

Steve sniffs at the air, the smell of food slowly dragging him from sleep. He turns his face a little more out of the pillow and cracks his eyes open when his mouth starts to water. Bucky walks in with three plates stacked high with pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon, naked as the day he was born. Steve’s eyes widen and his cock gives a twitch before he can think about anything to stop it, face warming.

“Buck-” he tries, voice groggy as he pushes himself up. Bucky pauses in the middle of setting all the plates down on the bed, glancing down at himself and then back up.

“We used to wander around naked in our apartment all the time,” he says.

Steve makes a face, heart sinking a little. Bucky ducks his head and goes.

“Sorry,” he says, walking back in wearing a pair of underwear and taking a slow seat on the bed, careful of the leaning towers of food. He’s not covered in scars like Steve keeps thinking he should be. Bucky has no other scars besides the one around his shoulder, and whatever he got before becoming the Winter Soldier. At least Steve’s like him in that way, he’s not covered in the scars he thinks he should be, either. What would they say, if he could see them? Would they help him remember any more, or not? “I remembered,” Bucky says, drawing Steve out of his thoughts. He’s hunched in a little on himself. Steve tries to focus on breakfast.

“I’m glad for you,” he says, at least he thinks he is. If it’s what Bucky wants, to remember, then Steve’s glad. At least it’s something other than Hydra in his head.

They eat quietly.

“Thanks. For making breakfast,” Steve says, rolling scrambled eggs and bacon in a pancake and taking a huge bite. It’s good. “I didn’t know you could cook,” he comments, but his mouth is so full it comes out garbled. He’s surprised Bucky seems to understand him.

“Remembered that, too,” Bucky grins a bit. Steve smiles a little around his mouthful. “I’ll wear clothes from now on,” Bucky adds, swallowing down a handful of eggs, “I just...it felt right. Natural.” Steve swallows his own bite while he takes the time to think.

“We...we aren’t mated,” he says after a minute, and Bucky pauses to stare at him.

“Do we need to be?” he asks, sounding genuine.

“I don’t know,” Steve replies honestly, looking down at the food Bucky made for them. For _them_. His cheeks and chest warm. “It feels like we should be, before doing that. Whatever you remember that we might’ve done when we were younger, things are different now. We’re...different now.”

And the thing is, he and Bucky haven’t had sex, not since their first and only time. Steve can’t remember much, but he _knows_ they’ve never done that before, that things weren’t _like_ that before, that how Steve felt about him was a secret. He’s not sure what to make of Bucky letting Steve kiss him now, of _Bucky_ kissing him now, especially since Bucky seems to be remembering more than he has. Has he always wanted to kiss Steve? Is it a new thing? Is he just touch starved because of Hydra? Is it a combination? Whatever the case, with everything that was going on, sex was the last thing on Steve’s mind, and the thought of having it only to wind up pregnant again is nauseatingly terrifying. Now that they _have_ the time to think about it, Steve doesn’t know what he wants to do, and he doesn’t know if he wants to face dealing with what it would mean if he _does_ want to be that intimate with Bucky again.

He loves Bucky, he already knows he loves Bucky and Steve’s told him, but loving him and wanting to _mate_ with him, whatever else that might entail because he can’t fuckin’ _remember_ and it’s not like he can just look it up, are two different things. Besides, Bucky never said he loved him back.

Bucky goes quiet, thinking it over, and Steve stuffs his face just for something to do in the ensuing silence. The rest of breakfast is a little tense, quiet, until Bucky suggests they go for a run. The tension leaves Steve’s shoulders and he practically leaps up from the bed, grateful.

\-----

The next week is spent like that, a strange tension looming around nearly everything they do. It’s not there all the time, and they still enjoy lazing about together, running under the stars, seeing the country, but it doesn’t just go away, either. 

Bucky slowly remembers more and more the more days go by, his stories and recalls of them paint Steve’s days and nights in colors Steve can’t remember, but listens to Bucky tell nonetheless. Some of them are interesting, some of them make his lips curl, but mostly it’s how Bucky is when he tells them to Steve, the way his face will light up, or his eyes, the way he’ll laugh low and quiet like it’s an inside joke, one he’s trying to make Steve a part of that Steve just...isn’t, and isn’t wholly sure that he wants to be.

But Steve listens, and he enjoys watching Bucky enjoy himself. Even when the memories become sad or distant and hazy, Bucky comes alive in new, different, old ways, and Steve wonders vaguely if that’s how _he_ would have looked, if he would have lit up from the inside out as each old light came back on and made him whole again.

It makes that tension hover, makes it tighten in Steve’s chest even while he watches Bucky, or maybe because he’s watching Bucky. The more days they spend together like this, the more memories Bucky gains, the more it starts feeling like it’s all coming to an end, an inevitable, impending pound against Steve’s sternum, a clock ticking down, leaving him waiting for the end of the most wonderful time that he can remember in this life, or the one before. He loves Bucky, he thinks he will always love Bucky, but he’s not naive enough to think that love will keep them together.

\-----

Steve’s heat is set to start with the official beginning of Autumn. He doesn’t know what day for sure, he can’t, but he can feel a pull starting low in his gut, somewhere warm and hidden in a place he doesn’t notice the rest of the time. 

He ignores it, the way the feeling grows a little more each day. He has a little more time. _Just a little more time_.

\-----

“I want to hunt down Hydra,” Bucky says one day in the haze and blur of their time together. He’s looking out the window, staring at something that could be out there in the trees, or something that could be in his head. Steve watches him from where he’s laying on his belly on the bed, cigarette between his lips and jaw resting in his hands. “I want answers,” Bucky continues, turning his head to look at him. He steps out of the sun and into the shadows as he makes his way towards Steve from across the room, coming to a stop and slowly crouching down in front of him at the end of the bed. “Will you come with me?” he asks, and Steve thinks of when he asked Bucky to run away with him, away from S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra and...everything, away from everything. When Steve tries to think about it, he finds it hard to think about going back, that tension back in his chest from Bucky’s words already, winding tight.

Steve doesn’t answer, can’t, too many answers pulling at him from all sides. Bucky just watches him, and then his expression softens at the conflict on Steve’s face, like he’s already got his answer. Maybe he does. Steve’s not sure if he’s given it.

“I don’t want you to leave,” Steve says instead, because that’s something he knows he can say with certainty, “Bucky. What if something happens?”

Bucky eases down to sit cross legged in front of the end of the bed, reaching up to gently pull the cigarette out from between Steve’s lips and bring it to his own. “I already died once,” he says, exhaling smoke into the air. Steve’s heart aches a little. “I want to know what they did to me,” Bucky continues, “If there’s more I don’t remember, and I need to know if...if there’s more of the ones they tried to make from me. I need to know if there’s any out there still alive, if I can save them from Hydra, one way or another. I need to know, Steve,” he adds more seriously, gaze sharp, decisive. 

Steve’s not going to be able to talk him out of it.

Bucky reaches over to stamp the cigarette out against one of his discarded boots since the cabin didn’t come with an ashtray, just watching the smoke dissipate for a few moments before looking back up at him.

“Do you want to remember?” Bucky asks, and Steve leans back a little, lowering his arms to rest on the bed, surprised. Bucky’s expression softens a little again and he reaches up, brushing his fingers across Steve’s cheek. “I remember you as you were now, mostly, but I feel like I know you as you are now better. And I know you well enough now to know that you don’t.”

Steve frowns a little, loses the battle with himself to hold eye contact and looks over towards the window, feels Bucky’s fingers slide off his cheek, then back again after Bucky sits up. 

“I don’t care if you remember or not,” Bucky says, soft and quiet, drawing Steve’s eyes back. Bucky’s are focused, serious. “But _I_ need to know. I need to go, Steve. I asked if you wanted to come, but I don’t want you to. I don’t want to drag you into anymore of this. I never did.”

“Bucky,” Steve says, helpless, eyes sliding shut as Bucky’s fingers push back into his hair as he rocks up onto his knees.

“ _Steve_ ,” Bucky breathes, breath ghosting across his lips. Steve opens his eyes and then leans closer, and kissing is familiar now, familiar and comforting even when it hurts a little knowing that Bucky is leaving.

Steve pushes himself up and Bucky tries to follow, barely breaks the kiss long enough to drag Steve down into his lap on the floor. Steve gets his hands in Bucky’s hair, a little longer now, like his own, and drags his fingers through it, swallowing down the pleased, hungry sounds Bucky makes low in the back of his throat. He feels Bucky’s fingers slide down, push up under the edge of his shirt and helps him, lifts his arms for Bucky to take it off and then takes away Bucky’s, reaching for the front of his pants after he drops it to the floor.

It’s not like their first time. It’s slower, every inch of _desperation_ and _wanting_ drug down to a crawl. Steve leaves trails of it along Bucky’s skin, draws his fingertips up Bucky’s chest, down the ridges of his abdomen, back up to the side of his neck. He can’t find any one place to stop, can’t stop trying to touch everything, every inch of skin and metal, the scar wrapped around Bucky’s shoulder, the dips and rises of the muscles protecting his ribs, the ones along his back. Bucky breathes roughly against his mouth when Steve’s fingers trace the seam of skin and metal, wraps his arms around Steve’s back and hauls him close, hauls him up just enough and Steve spreads his thighs.

He can’t remember having sex with anyone outside of Bucky during his heat, hasn’t even bothered to touch himself, so he’s surprised to find himself wet again. It’s not as much as his heat, and it’s a tight fit, enough to make him suck in a breath and for Bucky to slow down, his kisses and his body. But Bucky slides into him, with some friction, and Steve lets out a sound that’s a little pained, surprised, _pleasured_. It feels...it feels so different from anything that he can’t put words to it, and he doesn’t have the attention span now to try.

Bucky’s mouth finds his sweaty chin, his jaw, the side of his neck, tries to devour him while their bodies slowly find their rhythm, until they’re moving together, until Bucky’s sliding into him smoothly all the way and Steve’s rocking his hips to meet him, head dropping back to pant into the air, face turned up to the ceiling while Bucky leaves marks in his skin with his fingers and mouth and teeth, scrapes and bruises Steve doesn’t mind getting, _wants_ instead of feels obligated to take.

He lowers his head and finds Bucky’s mouth again when he feels himself getting close, when Bucky’s hips start jerking up sharper, gradually losing their rhythm as they coalesce. Steve’s moans are muffled into Bucky’s mouth and Bucky’s into his, Bucky’s fingers roughly gripping his hip while his body-warmed metal arm stays braced around Steve’s back, keeping them pressed flush together. Steve comes first and stars die and are born anew behind his eyelids, stream across the sky with the loudest silence, filled only with the sound of their heavy breathing, the low groan Bucky makes when Steve feels him come, too, hands and arms and legs tightening around each other as they meet and become one for the span of a fraction of a second, a lifetime.

The kiss breaks and Steve presses their foreheads together, panting heavy. It takes a couple minutes, but he opens his eyes, and Bucky drags open his own. They just breathe, staring at each other, looking into one another. Bucky’s hand slides up from Steve’s hip to his side, up further over his shoulder and the side of his neck back to his cheek.

“I love you,” Bucky says, almost a whisper, but loud enough he could be declaring it to the universe. It sounds like he is, to anything and everything willing to listen or not.

“That wasn’t goodbye,” Steve says, and Bucky shakes his head a little, leans up.

“No,” he says, lips brushing Steve’s, “That was a promise.” 

Their lips meet and seal the deal their bodies started. Not a goodbye, not one last, desperate cling to this thing between them, but a promise that Bucky will come back, and that this will be here when he does.

\--

Steve wakes in the evening to Bucky drawing designs on his back, tracing between ridges of muscles, trailing out of their set lines to draw his own thoughts and questions and answers. Steve cracks his eyes open, then closes them again, finding Bucky’s free hand on top of the bed and lacing their fingers together, gripping tight.

Bucky grips his back, and presses a kiss to Steve’s shoulder before Steve falls back to sleep.

\--

He wakes again in the night. Bucky’s still there, wrapped around him, but Steve can tell he’s awake, that he has been for a while, and that it’s time. He turns on the bed, forces himself to sit up and looks down at Bucky in the dark, in the moon and starlight coming in through the window, hears the crickets and animals outside the walls of the cabin and memorizes this moment, everything about it: the way their scents mix together, and mix with the ones left behind in the cabin, the remnants of Steve’s cigarette smoke still lingering in the shadows of the air, the way Bucky’s eyes look like crystals in the dark, always watching him.

Steve leans down and kisses him, long and slow and like they have another seven decades to do this, and then they part, and Bucky sits up and rolls up off of the bed.

Steve watches him get dressed, get ready to go. It takes too long and not long enough all at once, and then Bucky’s at the door, hand on the door handle and head turned to look at him from across the room.

They don’t say anything, there’s nothing to say, and Bucky goes, closing the door gently behind him.

Steve sits and listens to his heartbeat and bootsteps trail away, hears his motorcycle start up and counts the seconds before it starts to fade away, too. When Steve can’t hear it anymore, he lays back down and stares at the door until his eyes fall closed and he goes back to sleep.

\-----

Steve’s heat hits two days later and lasts three. He stuffs towels and blankets against the bottom of the doors and curls up on the bed to sweat it out, body overheated and aching. It’s not a rough heat, not nearly as bad as the one he had after the ice, and he’s free to move around, but he doesn’t really want to. He gets up long enough to check out the windows, focus his senses to make sure he’s still alone, and then tries to sleep the rest of the way through it, or space out at the tv in the far corner of the room that only gets one fuzzy signal. He eats the food and drinks the water they bought to get him through it, and by the time his heat is done, the miniature fridge is empty and Steve is free of his body’s longing. For the most part.

He grabs his things and cleans up the cabin as best he can, airs it out while he refolds towels and blankets and gets dressed, packs his things. He heads out after, bags strapped around his body and helmet in his hands. He stares down at it as he sits on his motorcycle, eventually drags his eyes back to look at the cabin for a minute before pulling his helmet on and starting his bike, heading out without a backwards glance.

It’s not home, just where he last and first felt like it was.

\-----

Traveling without Bucky is...less. Steve still visits places, monuments, has lunch while sitting on the edge of the Grand Canyon, watching a tour service take people down on mules. He sees the World’s Biggest Ball of Twine, goes to Las Vegas and gets entranced by all of the colors, eyes wide behind glasses he doesn’t need, under a hat to hide his gold hair. The dancers inside some of the buildings make him blush, but the water show is something he sits and watches, finds himself sketching on a small notepad for an hour before making himself move on. He thinks Bucky might have loved it, too, and makes a mental note to bring him when he gets back.

Steve wanders farther, farther, spends half a day at Niagara Falls and then goes to an aquarium, a zoo, makes a mental note about those, too. He sees a local band play in a Kentucky bar, watches wrestlers in Lost Angeles, stares at the ocean from the borders of California. Then, eventually, he feels pulled back East, and starts heading that way after cashing out a large amount of funds from a bank in Nebraska.

\-----

He ends up in Vermont, when the trees are vibrant yellows and reds and oranges with leaves littering the ground, travels through town after town until he finds a place that makes him pull over and stop at the side of the road. It has a long, gravel road leading down to the house and a barn from the main road that leads to town. Steve can see the house at the end on the right of the gravel road, the barn on the opposite side of it on the left with a lake next to it. There’s trees and so much grass, fields of it, the sun cresting over the mountain lighting the morning fog yellow. Steve’s lungs fill with morning dew and fresh green, turn his ribcage into a greenhouse and his lungs to flora. He feels it, here; this could be home.

He pulls his phone out, the untraceable one Stark gave him, and glances up to dial the number on the for sale sign.

\-----

“So! This is the place,” the realtor, Sharon, ironically, says as she gestures around, “And it’s all yours now. Oh! And here are the keys to the house, the garage, and the barn,” she adds, digging them out of her satchel and offering them over. Steve accepts them with a half-practiced smile. “You paid for discretion, which I completely understand and am going to cooperate with,” she adds quickly, hands raised in a placating gesture and red hair bobbing gently about her shoulders, “But do you need any help moving things in?”

“No,” Steve says, looking around the empty space, “It’s just me and what I have on me.”

“Well, alright,” she says, straightening her blouse with an unsure smile, “Your nearest neighbour is about two miles up the road, very nice man, does carpentry; I’m sure you’ll get along. Do you need anything before I go, Mr. Rogers?” Her blue-green eyes are kind, if a bit excited. Steve almost wishes he could still really draw, actual pieces like he apparently used to, just to be able to put the colors of her eyes down on paper.

“No, I’ll be fine,” he replies politely, “Think I just want to get settled in and get a better feel for the place. I’ll take care of the furniture situation tomorrow.”

“Alrighty! You have a good rest of the day now, alright?” she says on her way to the door, “And welcome to Vermont!”

“Thank you,” he says, and she gives him one last smile before closing the door behind her, her car heading up the road a couple minutes later. It’s a long road, and by the time she’s at the end of it, the sound of her car is distant enough that it doesn’t grate on his ears. It’s a nice change.

He takes another look around in a slow one-eighty before lifting his bag straps off over his head and settling his bags on the floor. The previous owners took all of the furniture, but that’s alright, he can sleep on the floor tonight and look around town for new furniture tomorrow, since he doesn’t miss the stuff from his old apartment and he doesn’t want to go up there where...everything and everyone is.

\--

He wakes up the next morning on the wood floor to an unlabeled moving truck coming down to park in his driveway, lifts his head up from his stuffed duffel bag and slowly rolls to his feet. The driver knocks on his front door with a clipboard of forms for him to sign with the Stark Logo at the top and Steve signs at the bottom before sliding a hand down his face.

Well, guess Stark took care of his furniture problem. Steve just hopes Tony didn’t tell anyone else where he lives now.


	21. Staying

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The life of Sam and Steve.

The furniture, at least, isn’t outlandish or tacky. The only outrageous piece is the fourth of July themed lamp that has sparkles _in_ the red, white, and blue paint. Steve figures it’s the only thing Ms. Potts probably compromised on since he actually likes the rest of the furniture, and he can’t picture Tony being the one to pick it all out. He’s got his skills, but interior decorating doesn’t seem like one of them. The couch is a rich, deep blue, darker than Steve’s stealth uniform had been, same with the armchair and sheet set. The mattress and frame are king sized and just shy of the right amount of soft when Steve plops down on it after the movers have gotten everything situated and left.

He props open a few windows to air out their scent.

The bed doesn’t come with a headboard, and Steve kind of wants to get a new frame for it, something more his own tastes, so he resolves to take a look around town. Maybe he’ll ask his carpenter neighbour if he has anything for sale.

Fortunately, the house itself still has its fridge, washer and dryer, and dishwasher, so he doesn’t need to buy those. He might look into getting a bigger fridge, but it looks like all he really needs to buy now are things he doesn’t have, like kitchenware and utensils, plates and mugs, and replace whatever Stark sent or that the house itself came with that he doesn’t like.

He heads outside, pulling the front door shut and locking it behind him before shoving his keys into his jeans pockets, and heads across the gravel drive to the barn. He only took a brief look around after he’d first called the realtor. The house and barn were both locked up, the owners already at their new place of living, according to Sharon. Now that Steve’s got the keys to the whole place, he’s going to take a deeper look around.

The lock on the barn is old, the kind that takes the skeleton key on the keyring. Steve pulls the thick chains off enough to yank a door open, dodging a memory or two he doesn’t want to dwell on about being bound to a steel table, metal pressing into his shoulder blades and lower spine.

His right hand’s fingers curl briefly.

He steps inside the barn and takes a look around, eyes slowly wandering up.

The ceiling is high. He could probably fit a small yacht in here if he tried. It still smells like farm animals, but the scent is stale, fading a little more with every breeze. He can’t discern exactly what used to be in here unless he focuses. The previous owners took most of the tools and equipment, so the walls are mostly bare, a few rusted and stray tools hanging here and there, a pitchfork propped up against the far left wall. It looks like the barn itself was well maintained; he can’t spot anything that needs work.

Steve wanders over and starts climbing up the wooden ladder straight ahead, pulling himself up onto the second level. There’s a half door straight ahead, built into the far wall, bottom starting at his waist. He unhinges the locks and pulls it open.

Fields of grass spread out below, the lake curving away from him on the left. There’s trees barely swaying in the cool breeze up ahead, wrapping around what looks like two football field lengths of green. Steve takes in a deep breath, lets his eyes fall shut while he absorbs the sounds and smells, relishes the Fall air in his lungs. There’s birds, an abundance of birds; he thinks he hears hooves off in the forest, too, can almost smell the deer.

He opens his eyes and looks out.

He thinks Bucky might like it here.

He climbs down a little later, after closing and latching the half door, then does the same with the barn door, chaining it back up and turning the key in the lock. The sound of steps on gravel draws his eyes up, turning his head in the direction of the road. There’s a man coming down in a gray sweatshirt and dark gray running shorts with neon green stripes down the sides. He’s down wind, so Steve can’t smell him yet, but he looks...familiar.

“ _Well, if it isn’t the running man!_ ” the guy calls once he’s closer, and it _clicks_ then.

“You!” Steve calls back, stepping away from the barn and heading towards him, “Sam Wilson!”

Wilson cracks a grin. “Looks like we’re neighbours!”

“You’re the carpenter?” Steve asks, raising a brow.

“That’s me,” Wilson replies, slowing to a stop a few feet away, “Wasn’t sure I’d see you again. To be honest, I actually kind of missed you lapping me around the Mall.”

Steve eyes him, tilting his head up a little. Now that he’s closer, Steve can smell his scent on the air: exertion sweat and something earth-spiced. He can’t put his finger on it. “Honestly? I’m more than a little suspicious that you’re here,” Steve says, angling his body a little away.

Wilson raises his brows, then quirks his lips. “I’ve been here for about three months _. You_ just became _my_ neighbour. It’s _I_ who should be suspicious.”

Steve blinks, then ducks his head just a little. Okay, true, if his story is to be believed. Still, it’s hard for Steve to trust in coincidences anymore. “What happened to the V.A.?” he asks.

“Well,” Wilson starts, crossing his arms loosely across his chest, “Got a promotion, things were going good, then found out my aunt was sick and decided to take some vacation time, come spend it up here with her. She got better, but said she had, and I quote, ‘ _A life altering epiphany in the throes of her dying days_ ’. She decided to head over and pursue her dreams of being a baker-slash-painter in Paris.” He shrugs, shaking his head a little like even he can’t believe it. “She’s had the house for the past ten years and some good memories there, so she decided to leave it to me instead of selling it. And I figured, well, the house is a lot nicer than my place in the city, and my life’s kind of been taking a change since you and I last ran into each other.”

Wilson cracks a smile at the pun and Steve’s lips twitch, curl up a little.

“So,” Wilson continues, “I thought, ‘ _why not?_ ’ Decided to try and put my hobby to use, and turns out, town loves the things I make. I still work at the V.A. Some of the vets prefer Skype or phone calls than in person, face-to-face, so it works out. Besides,” he adds, gesturing out with both hands, “Aliens don’t generally attack the middle of Vermont, not even in the movies.”

Steve snorts a quiet laugh at that, nodding his head to concede the point, and makes a mental note to check out Wilson’s story as soon as he gets his internet installed, or finds wifi or a computer in town.

“So, what are _you_ doing out here,” Wilson asks.

Steve sighs a little. “I...basically quit heroing and decided to move here,” he answers, honest. Wilson’s eyebrows rise so high it’s actually worrying.

“You’re serious?” he asks, and Steve nods. “Well, damn. That’s a big change.”

“Yeah,” Steve replies, smiling a little, “My...priorities have changed.”

“Honestly? I’m glad to hear it,” Wilson says, and Steve blinks, not expecting that. Wilson glances around and then leans closer, shielding the side of his mouth with a hand and lowering his voice conspiratorially. “Did they let you keep the shield though?”

Steve snorts quietly. “I might have taken it with me without thinking.”

Wilson cracks another grin. “I think I might need a drink. You drink tea? I’ve been on a binge for the last month.”

Steve tilts his head a little in thought. “Maybe I’ll take you up on that later,” he replies, “I’d offer you water since we’re both here, but I need to go buy some glasses.”

Wilson’s eyebrows rise again. “You don’t even have glasses?” Steve shakes his head a little and Wilson shakes his own, gesturing to the road, “I’m gonna go shower and get my car, and then you and I?” he says, gesturing between the two of them, “We’re gonna go get you some supplies. If you want,” he adds, “I don’t want to hustle you into anything.”

“I think I’d enjoy the company, actually,” Steve replies, smiling a little. It’ll be nice to get his mind off of Bucky for a little bit, and it might be good to have someone with him who’s been in town longer than he has. He only remembers it from passing through once, and he’s not sure how the locals are going to react to a new resident.

“Alright,” Wilson smiles, “I’ll be back in a bit!” he calls as he starts jogging for the road. Steve watches him go for a minute before turning back to the house, getting his door open and heading into the- _his_ bedroom, _his_ , to grab the bag his shield is resting in, waiting until he hears tires on gravel forty-five minutes later before heading out to his bike.

\--

Town is quiet, peaceful on a Monday morning, everyone squirreled away in their places of business. Wilson leads him to a coffee shop two streets over from where they parked, insisting Steve try their ‘new pumpkin spice latte’. Steve takes a careful sip after walking around for five minutes to let it cool down a bit, eyelids fluttering closed with a soft hum as the heat slides down to his belly.

“Right?” Wilson asks, grinning a bit. Steve hums an agreement.

They check out a couple furniture stores, but Steve doesn’t find anything he likes more than a passing glance, though he does end up stuck staring consideringly at an old drawing table in the local antique store. He’s expecting Wilson to say something about it. Everybody knows Captain America used to draw.

“You should get a truck,” Wilson says instead. Steve looks over, surprised. Wilson nods his chin towards the table. “If you want to buy something big and haul it home yourself. That and Winter’s coming.”

Steve pauses, opens his mouth-

“And don’t even _think_ about quoting that tv show,” Wilson cuts in.

Steve’s brows draw together. “What tv show?”

“Oh, thank God,” Wilson says, looking heavenward, “Just for that, I’m treating you to the pumpkin spice ice cream down the street.”

Steve snorts quietly but follows him back out onto the sidewalk and into the cold. “You sure like pumpkin spice,” Steve comments, dropping his coffee cup in the nearby trash bin after Wilson’s, Steve’s resounding with a heavy _thump_ and hoping Wilson doesn’t notice.

“You will too,” Wilson replies, “If not, there’s always peppermint. I’ll convert you to one of the seasonal flavors, just you wait. You like gingerbread?”

Steve’s lips twitch.

What he really likes is his and Wilson’s conversations. Steve hasn’t smiled this much since before Bucky left. And it’s nice, having someone just treat him like a normal person. He’s not Captain America and he’s not the Steve Rogers of the past, he’s just...him.

He closes his eyes for a moment, taking in a deep breath and focusing on the smells of the town, the chilly cool air and the sounds of a few people coming and going, steps hitting the sidewalk like his and Wilson’s own.

The ice cream, it turns out, is even better than the coffee. Steve finishes every last bite while Wilson grins, triumphant.

\--

Steve doesn’t end up buying anything more than a laptop to hook up to the internet router at his place and a few supplies: dish soap, hand soap, shampoo, some dry foods and a few other necessities. They go to Wilson’s house after, and it’s a nice place, a little nicer than Steve’s, actually. The barn doors are closed when they walk past it but Steve can smell fresh wood shavings and power tools in the air. He’s looking forward to seeing Wilson’s work.

Steve follows him inside, where they’re greeted with a calico making a beeline for Wilson’s ankles.

“That come with the house, too?” Steve jokes, while Wilson picks it up, tapping their noses together gently before settling it in his arms to pet.

“Actually, yes,” Wilson admits with a small grin, “Her name is Whiskers. Not very original for being named by an aspiring artist, I know, but it is what it is. Want a glass of water?”

Steve shakes his head a little after snorting quietly, looking around while Wilson puts the cat down, steps moving away.

Some of the furniture doesn’t quite fit, wooden tables and lampstands with smooth and subtle designs in them, stars and planets and trees all flowing together, intertwined. They’re lovely, and for all that they don’t quite fit, they make the room feel homier, somehow.

“These yours?” Steve asks, gesturing to the tables and stands before looking over to where Wilson’s moved into the open kitchen, half through chugging a glass of water when he looks back.

He takes a break and a breath.

“Yup, those are mine,” he replies, “Took classes in college. I couldn’t pick it up right after I got back from the tours because of the equipment sounds, but once I could, I just started cranking out one thing after another in my down time. Those are some of the first pieces I made after knocking some of the rust off.”

“They’re beautiful,” Steve says, “I was going to look around online since I didn’t see anything in town I wanted, but...any chance I could buy a double ended, king sized headboard bed frame from you?”

“Sure,” Wilson replies, straightening, looking surprised. He looks around quick before grabbing the magnetic notepad off of the steel fridge, clicking open the attached pen. “Any specific designs you want?”

“...Wolves,” Steve answers slowly, thoughtfully, “And stars.”

“I can do that,” Wilson says, jotting it down. He looks up with a smile and Steve smiles a little back. “I’ll sketch out some ideas and stop by tomorrow so we can hammer out the details.

“Thanks,” Steve returns, watching Wilson re-stick the notepad and pen to the fridge.

“No problem,” Wilson says before finishing his glass of water.

\--

Steve gets his new laptop set up when he gets back home, gets the wireless going and fiddles around with it, laying on his stomach on his new sheets on his new bed. He looks up Wilson’s story first, what he can of it. What he finds proves that yes, Wilson is still listed as a counselor at the V.A. in D.C., and that yes, the house has been left in his name. Anything else Steve can’t find just by intense Googling around, so he moves on and browses through different sites for things he needs to buy. He’s still a little wary of Wilson, but now he’s less paranoid that Fury might have planted him here somehow, or Hydra.

Steve spends an hour perusing and gets a set of glassware and cooking utensils from one website, silverware from another, and pots and pans from one more. After paying through, new address memorized and inputted, he closes out of the browser and shuts his laptop down, closing the lid and sliding the whole thing under one of his new pillows. He rolls onto his back and stares up at the ceiling. The remnant taste of the ice cream has been brushed from his teeth but he draws his tongue over them and remembers, wonders. Would Bucky like it? They never got to try any seasonal drinks or ice creams together.

...Is Bucky okay?

Steve worries his lower lip between his canines.

This peace can’t last, but he savors it, even without Bucky here. Still, he wonders if Bucky will like it here. He’ll find Steve, Steve has no doubt, he just hopes that Bucky will like what he finds when he does.

Steve rolls over and sticks his mottled hand up under his pillow, staring across at the wall until he closes his eyes and finally falls asleep to the sound of crickets and owl hoots out in the night. He dreams of town, of the ferris wheel and holding Bucky’s hand, and of Bucky pressing kiss after kiss to his lips.

\--

Steve spends the next day mostly staring out the various windows around the house out at the property, _his_ property. He goes to town to buy some food at some point, because he forgot to yesterday, and takes a look at the trucks for sale in the used car lot while he’s there per Wilson’s suggestion, then heads back- home. _Home_. It’s a little weird to think of it as home, just because he can’t remember home, but it feels almost...easy, too, right. It’s a light, warm feeling in his chest that makes him want to curl his toes in something like pleasure.

Wilson stops by in the early afternoon, car tires rolling down the gravel of Steve’s long driveway. Steve opens the door when Wilson parks and gives a small wave, smiling a little when Wilson grins bright over at him, sun spilling down on him in gold and everything. Steve’s a little blinded, and not just by the glow. Wilson just radiates _good_ and _calm_ , and Steve finds himself really hoping that he’s not a plant for someone.

They spend twenty minutes going over the design ideas Wilson sketched up. Steve has a hard time picking at first, but the longer he looks at them, the more something in him loosens. The more he focuses on what the design means to him, the more easier it gets, the more relaxed he gets in general. Eventually, Wilson finally asks the question.

“So why wolves and stars?”

Steve pauses, looking over from the pictures. Wilson raises his hands a little to placate.

“It helps,” he says, “My knowing what the design means to the person it’s for. Helps me put the emotions and reasons into the work so they come out the best I can make them, is all. It’s fine you don’t want to tell me, I can work with that too,” he adds.

Steve frowns a little, looking at the design he’s settled on before lowering the page to the table. “I just...I feel a deep, personal attachment to wolves,” he tries.

“Like a totem?” Wilson asks, “Or a guide?”

Steve lets his head lull in a little tilt to the side, trying to figure out how to explain it without explaining _it_. “I guess...you could call it that,” he says slowly, still thinking through it, “More like...I feel like one? I feel like the wolf is me, and I’m the wolf. I don’t...really know how to explain it in a way you might understand.” He glances over a little apologetically. Wilson looks thoughtful, eyes on the design now, too.

“So more like an inner persona,” Wilson hedges, sounds like he’s still thinking about it as he says it, “A representation. An ‘inner you’ sort of deal.”

“Something like that, yes,” Steve replies. Wilson stares at the design for another moment, brows furrowed, then nods, dragging his eyes back up. He smiles, and Steve finds himself relaxing from where he’d gone a little tense.

“And the others?” Wilson asks.

Steve looks back down to the design, pointing at the wolf wrapped around one side of the frame, then the other. “Me. The person I love. I’m not sure who the other two are just yet.” But he thinks he has an idea for who the third is, at least.

“And the stars?” Wilson asks next, and Steve hums, drawing an invisible one over his chest with a finger. “Ah, right. Kind of self explanatory.” Wilson grins. Steve smiles a little wryly back.

Wilson- “ _You can call me Sam_ ,” heads back to his place and they trade numbers before he goes, Steve returning the name gesture. Sam doesn’t smell like a bad person, or even a malicious one. His scent has something peculiar about it, something like Steve’s but not, earth scented but spiced in a different way, and Steve hasn’t found anything on him that might suggest he even works for an organization outside of the V.A. It’s not foolproof, but Steve’s gut is saying he’s okay. It’ll probably take more for his brain to follow suit, after everything, but Steve’s not opposed to the idea that Sam could become a real friend. And, well, if they’re going to be seeing each other off and on, it would be easier to call him by his first name.

Steve finds dinner an hour later, showers, then goes to lay on his bed again. He tugs his phone down from his pillow and brings it up into his view of the ceiling, opening his contacts. He only has two. He taps down to the second one.

 

_thinking about getting a truck tomorrow. Can I ask you for a ride into town?_

 

His phone _pings_ a few moments later.

 

_sure. just let me know when_

_Thanks_

_np. Oh, hey. Do u want to run with me in the mornings? I’ll even let you lap me ;P_

 

Steve blinks, then snorts a quiet laugh.

 

_nah. I’m staying away from anything strenuous. I didn’t buy this place to work_

_suit yourself, walking man. Now I can finally be first place 8p_

 

Steve snorts again, smiling a little stupidly at his phone. At least, the smile feels a little stupid, chest warm and light. It’s a good feeling. He hadn’t really accounted for how quiet it would be out here when he bought the place, not in the way of him wanting company. He’s been wary of it since S.H.I.E.L.D., but that doesn’t really drive away the need for it.

 

_goodnight, sam_

_night, steve_

 

Steve taps his screen off and slides his phone up under his pillow next to his laptop. He’ll need to ask if Sam can make him a nightstand, too, it’s getting a little crowded under there.

\-----

The house is different from his apartment in a lot of ways. It’s quieter, for one. There isn’t the constant background noise of cars coming and going, people walking and chattering back and forth, up and down the street. The house is far larger, too. There’s so much space, Steve’s not sure what he’s going to do with it all. He spends half an hour just running from room to room, down one hall and then another, turns it into a game and then a test to test his reflexes, get familiar with the curves and angles and placement of the walls and rooms and halls, just in case he needs to know them like the back of his hands. The house is also completely paid off, all his own.

...Which means when the pipe under the kitchen sink busts, that’s all his own, too.

Steve panics, finds as many towels and pots as he can, then calls Sam. He’s faced aliens, werewolves, _humans_ , but broken kitchen sinks guzzling water all over his tile floor is a completely different thing entirely.

After Sam’s arrived, half of Steve’s kitchen covered in drenched towels, Steve silently watches his hands as he tightens the pipe with a wrench, feeling guilty. Steve grabs the last towel he has where he’s crouched a couple feet away, saving it for when Sam’s done. Sam eventually finishes with a _twist_ and the pipe gives a last, desperate squirt to his face and Steve winces.

Sam sits up and Steve offers the towel. Sam takes it with a, “Thanks,” wiping his face down with it.

“Sorry,” Steve cringes a little. Sam’s face resurfaces up out of the towel.

“I’ve got a list of all the town ‘need to know’ numbers my aunt left me,” he says, “I took a picture with my phone for you. Give me a sec,” he says, pushing himself up to his feet with Steve standing up out of his crouch to follow suit. Sam pulls his phone out and taps a bit and then Steve’s phone chirps. He opens the message and saves the picture.

“Thanks,” he says, looking back up, “I can throw a deadly metal frisbee with perfect precision, but I have no idea how to fix a sink pipe that’s sprung a leak. Not sure if I ever knew.”

“‘If you ever knew’?” Sam asks, looking over.

Steve pauses. Right. His memory issues aren’t public knowledge.

His…

He stares.

“I may have only ever fixed one sink in my life,” Steve lies casually.

“Well, I can’t imagine Captain America having to fix many,” Sam jokes, “Try the number on the list. They’ll probably be able to help. I, on the other hand, need to go change.”

Steve blinks then nods, accepting the towel and watching Sam go. Maybe he really _isn’t_ a plant.

Steve calls the number from the picture. It’s another stranger in his house whose scent Steve needs to air out after, but it gets his sink fixed and when Steve checks, there’s no bugs.

His glasses arrive three days later. Some of them are cracked, most of them are not. Steve tosses the cracked ones and puts the rest in the dishwasher, finally has a reason to crack open his new dish soap. He moves over to stare out the window at the trees while the sound of the dishwasher running fades to background noise. He imagines him and Bucky running through the forest, around the trees, chasing each other and rolling in the fields of grass.

He digs his pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and shakes one out, sticking it between his lips. He gets his lighter out and flicks it on, leaning in-

He blinks out of his daydreams and jerks his head back a bit away from the fire, lifting his thumb off the lighter and killing the flame. He pulls the cigarette out of his mouth and takes a long look at it, then crushes it with the pack in his hand as he walks over, dropping all of it in the trash.

No more of that.


	22. September

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to a talk with Kay I know what Wisteria is I've been thinking it was Lavender for like the past year lmao. It smells really nice.

He doesn’t get the itch to shift when the full moon arrives, but the one to run is there, cresting like the tide at the height of the full moon. Steve doesn’t change, but he does take his shoes off and sprint through the grass, soft blades dipping cool between his toes. He runs to the border of his property and back, skids to a stop in the dirt and races the perimeter, chasing a few deer along the way, hopping over rocks and fallen trees.

He collapses on his bed when he gets back, sprawled on his back in the middle of it and breathing quick, energy still thrumming throughout his body, prickling under his skin like static electricity. He groans quietly and shifts around, cock half hard in his pants, and strokes a hand over it, then shoves his sweatpants down over his thighs and spreads his legs to wrap his fingers around himself, panting.

 _I can be as loud as I want_ , he realizes dizzily, which just makes him think about Bucky, makes him harder. He strokes once, long and slow, then speeds up, turning his head to the side and closing his eyes.

He can almost feel Bucky kissing up his throat, tugging gently at his earlobe with his teeth, lips brushing soft and stubble almost-rough. Bucky’s hands roaming his body, pushing up his shirt to get at his skin, moving down to slide down the tops of his thighs, around to the sides to cage him in, lips wrapping around the head of his cock-

Steve presses and rubs his thumb against the slit and arches his back against the bed, coming with a loud moan, heat pulsing at the base of his spine and behind his closed eyelids with the pumping of his heart. He groans, pulling his hand off of himself and collapsing back to the bed, panting, bringing it up to lick it cleaning. He imagines it’s Bucky’s tongue instead of his own, Bucky’s eyes glowing, watching him.

Steve’s cock gives a twitch and he gets himself off one more time, taking the last of the full moon high with it. He crashes, after, in the middle of his bed, swiftly taken down by sleep into the dark, where he dreams of the light.

\--

Steve makes eggs in the morning, humming to himself. Tapping at his front door draws his attention and he leans back away from the pan to take a whiff.

Sam.

“ _Coming!_ ” Steve calls, flipping the eggs one more time before turning the stove off and moving the pan back to a cool burner before heading to the door. He unlocks it and pulls it open, smiling at Sam through the window and stepping aside to let him in.

“You’re in a good mood,” Sam comments, pulling off his jacket. Steve closes and locks the door behind him before leading the way back into the kitchen.

“I had a good night,” he replies, looking back, “You look like you’re in a good mood, too.”

“I had a good night too,” Sam says with a small grin, laying his coat over the arm of the couch and following. He smells a little more earth-spiced than usual. It’s a good smell.

Steve sees Sam lean against the counter in his periphery, feels Sam’s eyes on him as Steve gets one of his new plates down out of the cupboard and pushes his eggs out of the pan onto it. He digs a fork out of the drawer and shoves a mouthful of eggs into his mouth, humming quietly.

“So, what’s on the agenda for today?” Sam asks. Steve hums again, swallowing his mouthful.

“Thought maybe I’d go into town again, take a longer look around,” he replies, “Wanna come?”

“Sure,” Sam replies easily, “School just started, too, so it should be quiet until about two.”

“Oh.” Steve blinks, and Sam cracks a grin.

“Forgot, huh,” he says.

“Yeah,” Steve replies, eating another mouthful and thinking while he chews, swallows. “It’s not something that’s really on my mind. There any bus stops nearby?”

“Just down the road, since your other neighbours have a kid,” Sam answers, “Pretty sure the bus stops at each house this far out. You planning on having any kids?”

Steve pauses, considering the last of his eggs. He eats another mouthful while he thinks that over. 

“Maybe,” he says eventually, cleaning off the last of his plate before moving over to put it and his fork in the dishwasher, grabbing a glass out of the cupboard and raising it at Sam in question. Sam shakes his head, so Steve just fills the one from the sink. “I hadn’t really thought about it before.”

 _I don’t think_ , he doesn’t add. He’s not sure if he wanted kids Before, and even with Bucky’s memories, Bucky never said, not that Steve blames him. He didn’t want to ask about it, either, and with everything that happened after he woke up and...later, he hasn’t really had the time to just stop and think about it, but… 

“I think I’d like to have at least one,” Steve says, looking back over at Sam while he drains half his glass and swallows, “You?”

Sam hums consideringly, resting his cheek in a hand. “Maybe,” he answers, “Eventually. Think I’m most comfortable being ‘Uncle Samsam’, currently,” he grins.

Steve perks up a little. “You’re an uncle?”

“Yeeah, technically,” Sam draws out, “My cousin has kids and I’m the godfather, but they call me uncle. It’s all the same to me.” He smiles again, big and warm, and Steve can’t help smiling back.

“What’s that like?” he asks.

“Kids?” Sam asks, and Steve nods, putting his glass in the dishwasher too before walking back over to lean on his arms on the counter opposite Sam. “Crazy,” Sam answers, raising his hands and spreading his fingers wide before resting them back down on the granite, “They’ve got way more energy than I do, even with the morning runs. But it’s great; it’s fun. I love seeing how much bigger they are and how they’ve changed every time I visit or my cousin Skype calls.”

Steve’s lips quirk, looking down at the counter then out the nearest window. It’s easy to picture, makes that hole in his chest ache but...it’s a bittersweet feeling.

“So, ready to go?” Sam eventually asks, drawing Steve out of his thoughts.

“Yeah,” he says, pushing himself up off of the counter and heading for the hall, “Let me grab my jacket and shoes.”

\--

They stop at the local coffee shop again, the other patron’s eyes on them both from various spots around the shop. Steve keeps them in his periphery and orders a hot chocolate this time. It has the bonus of keeping his hands extra warm as they exit the warm, wood interior of the shop back out into the mild, cool Autumn air, soothing shop music going faded and muffled as the door closes with a final _twi-tinkle_ of the bell. They start meandering down the street, passing the hanging pumpkin decorations in the shop window and heading vaguely in the direction of the used car lot. 

Steve keeps his hat pulled low, steam from his hot chocolate gently fogging his glasses. They enter the lot ten minutes later and head over to where all of the trucks are parked in the far right curve, perusing.

“You know what you’re looking for?” Sam asks, taking a small sip of his latte. Steve can smell the pumpkin spice scent and takes a sip of his chocolate.

“Mostly just something with four doors, plenty of room, and works right,” he replies, stopping to lean over and peer into the window of something that looks relatively new.

“And blue,” Sam teases. 

Steve pulls back and looks at him before looking back to the truck, which is, for a fact, blue.

“Maybe,” he concedes, taking another sip of his drink just before a dealer catches sight of them and starts making a beeline. Steve steels himself while Sam gives him a good luck, commiserating pat on the shoulder.

 _Thanks_ , Steve thinks. Can’t be much worse than a reporter, right?

\--

He ends up buying something big, dark blue, with four doors and a pickup bed that seems to drive fine on his way home, following Sam’s car down the long stretch of road away from town. Steve checks his mirrors and flicks his blinker on when they get close, slowing as he pulls off to the side of the road and coming to a stop just before his mailbox at the top of his drive.

He hops out into the cold to check it, but there’s nothing, fortunately or unfortunately. Just after he pushes the lid closed, the sound of a bus catches his ears, big and heaving, and Steve turns, looking back down the road.

It matches the scenery better than it will in Winter, mustard-cheese yellow fitting in among the reddening and orange leaves. He sees a few young faces peering out at him through the windows as it passes, no more than three, speeding away as the bus makes its rounds. Steve’s lips curl a little and then he heads over and hops back into his truck, putting it into gear and heading for Sam’s.

He eases down Sam’s gravel driveway a few minutes later, truck cab rocking gently over the rocks. He pulls in next to Sam’s car, parking and killing the engine and getting out to head up to the front door. 

“Hey,” Sam grins as he pulls it open, gesturing him inside, “Took you a minute.”

“Stopped to check the mail,” Steve replies, stepping in, careful to stay on the rug as he toes his shoes off. 

“I’m making quesadillas for lunch, want some?” Sam asks as Steve follows him into the kitchen. They seem to spend a lot of time in their respective kitchens. Maybe Steve should think about making his a little more inviting.

“...Sure,” he decides. If he’s going to try trusting Sam, now might be a good time. He still doesn’t smell bad and he hasn’t triggered any of Steve’s internal alarms; far from it.

Steve hops up onto one of the bar chairs and leans on his forearms on the counter to watch Sam work, glancing over when Whiskers eventually hops up on the counter to watch, too. He’s surprised when she wanders over to him, plopping down and curling up a few inches away from his fingers. He decides not to press his luck by petting her.

“Hey, Sam,” he says after a few minutes. Sam hums back in question, eyes on the food as he carefully sets it into the pan, tortillas sizzling quietly. “Are you working for S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“What?” Sam asks, turning to look over at him. Steve looks at him closely. His pupils haven’t dilated and his heartbeat has barely picked up.

“Are you working with Hydra?” Steve asks next, “Hunters?”

Sam stares at him, looking thrown, but nothing changes. He doesn’t even start sweating and Steve can’t smell any anxiety. He’d be able to tell if Sam was covering, he’s sure of it. Even Romanoff would give something away, but so far there’s...nothing.

Steve slowly relaxes.

“ _Hydra?_ ” Sam asks, almost squawks, “I thought they were wiped out seventy years ago? And what are _hunters?_ ”

Steve blows out a slow breath, lacing his fingers together on top of the counter. “You sure you want to know?” he asks. Sam looks at him for a moment before turning back to the food, carefully flipping the quesadilla with a spatula and fork, then looking back.

“Tell me,” he says, “Sounds like something I should.”

So, Steve catches him up on everything but the werewolf thing, and...and what he lost. Afterwards, Sam just stares down at the counter, two plates settled in front of them, warm and steaming. It smells delicious, all _meat_ and _cheese_ and _peppers_.

“Wow,” Sam finally says while Steve rips off a piece of his quesadilla, popping it quickly into his mouth to keep from burning his fingertips, “So...Hydra’s still around, had your Sergeant from _World War Two_ all this time, turned him into some stop secret, world class assassin, sent him after you and _Tony Stark_ , and these hunters have a personal grudge against him for killing their leader?”

Steve hums an agreement, chewing. “Something like that,” he answers after he swallows, tearing off another piece. Sam seems honestly surprised, smells it too, and the food doesn’t taste or smelled altered in any way. There’s some poisons that don’t have a scent or taste, S.H.I.E.L.D. gave him a run down, but Sam’s reaction is promising.

“And James Barnes,” Sam adds, looking over, “Where is he?”

“We...split up,” Steve answers slowly after he swallows another bite, still watching and listening and scenting Sam carefully, “He needed answers. I didn’t. I wanted to go with him, but…” _But I didn’t want to keep digging_ , he thinks. “We both agreed for me not to.”

They eat in silence for a bit. Steve gently nudges Whiskers’ whiskers away from his plate while Sam absorbs everything.

“Are you going to fight Hydra?” Sam asks, looking over again, “Even not remembering everything?”

Steve looks at him for a few moments before shaking his head, ripping another piece off of his food. “No,” he answers, eating the bite and swallowing, “I know maybe I should, that _Captain America_ would, but I don’t...I don’t want that life,” he slowly realizes, “I want...I want my _own_ life, as I am right now. Is that wrong?”

“No,” Sam answers after a moment, looking back down at his own food, “I don’t think so. You and him, more than anyone…I think you guys should be able to say when you’ve had enough, whenever you’re ready.” Steve frowns down at his plate. “You’ve given a lot,” Sam continues, “Your lives, your memories, your _eras_...it’s a lot. More than anyone.”

Steve absorbs that while he eats, brow slightly furrowed. “Even if I can’t remember?” he asks quietly, “Isn’t that just an excuse?”

“Maybe to some,” Sam returns, “But not to me. And I think in that case, all of what I said applies _especially_ if you can’t remember.”

They finish their food in silence, Steve’s contemplative, Sam’s puzzle solving. Sam climbs down from his perch after to put their plates in the dishwasher even though Steve offers to. 

“Water? Tea?” Sam asks, reaching over to fill up an- electric kettle?

“Water,” Steve hazards, “Thanks.”

Sam nods, filling up a glass and offering it over. Steve takes it with a, “Thanks,” and takes a sip. It smells and taste fine, too. Sam is... _is Sam really okay?_ Steve just risked a lot trying to find out and make sure, but none of this is going to work out very well if he doesn’t have at least _one_ ally out here. And if Sam was a plant, none of it would have worked out anyway, in the long run. Steve shouldn’t have...But there wasn’t any real other way to find out without possibly _hurting_ him, and Steve’s...he’s tired of hurting, period. If it turns out he’s fucked up again, he’ll just...he’ll have to find a way to live with it, like all the rest.

He frowns down deeply at his glass, stomach and heart twisting, blinking out of it when Sam speaks up.

“You wanna stay over for a movie?” Sam asks.

Steve shakes his head a little to try and clear his thoughts, his _worries_. “I think I’m gonna head home. I’ve been enjoying starfishing in the middle of my huge new bed.” 

Sam snorts a laugh. He accepts Steve’s glass back and then walks him to do the door.

“Thanks for telling me,” Sam says as Steve put his shoes on.

Steve pauses, and tries not to worry, _panic_ , tries to accept that Sam is _okay_. It’s _ **okay.**_

“Thank you for helping me with everything,” he returns. They share a small smile and Steve goes, feeling...lighter, even though he’s also spiraling. He’s still not fully sure he can trust Sam, but he’s feeling more and more like he can. Even if the panic is cloying up his throat and he’ll have a break down a mile down the road in it, it’s something.

He looks up at the sky as he heads for his truck.

He hopes Bucky’s okay, wherever he is.

Somewhere in northern Europe, Bucky wonders the same thing, staring up at the stars. 

He pulls the hammer back on his gun and looks down from the sky, glancing to the steel door. 

Eleven more Hydra bases to go, and then he can go _home_.

 _Just a little more_ , he thinks, a whisper in his mind, _Just a little more, Steve_.

\-----

Steve visits Sam again the next day, and the next. A week goes by and Steve finally asks him about the barn.

“Can I see your other works in the barn?” he asks, “If there’s any and you don’t mind?”

Sam looks up from peeking into the slow cooker. It’s really starting to smell good. Steve can pick out the individual smells, can practically taste them on his tongue when he breathes in through his mouth: pot roast, carrots, celery, onion. He might have to ask Sam for cooking lessons and move on from sandwiches and protein shakes, quick-fix foods.

“Sure, if you want,” Sam replies, a little surprised, putting the lid back on the pot, “Follow me.”

Steve does, slips his socked feet back into his shoes and follows Sam out the front door, straight ahead to the barn. It blocks most of the house from view from the road, unlike Steve’s, but it’s far enough away from the house that it doesn’t completely cast the house in afternoon shadow.

Sam unchains the front doors and Steve follows him inside, glancing at the chains briefly as he goes.

There’s equipment about in some order of Sam’s design. Steve assumes it’s used for his carpentry. On their surfaces, tables, and shelves are a small array of large, wood things, some finished, some in various stages of complete, all beautiful. He can see a rough fox coiled around a small tree stump, love birds nesting together, a panda chewing on some bamboo, and-

Steve blinks. “Is that a whale?”

Sam looks to where his gaze is. “Yup,” Sam pops the ‘p’, “That is a whale. Neighbours down the road commissioned it for their newborn.” It’s about the size of a medium dog, gently curved towards them like it’s thinking of turning. The wood hasn’t been smoothed out yet, still has rough edges and blocky angles, but the design looks finished, has variously sized stars littered around it to make it look like it’s swimming in a galaxy.

“That’s amazing, Sam,” Steve breathes. Sam looks like he wants to duck his head, smile stretching warm and gentle from ear to ear. He looks almost bashful. Steve can’t help smiling.

“Thanks,” Sam replies, “I hope their little guy likes it when he gets older.”

Steve smile again, looking back to the whale, chest warm. He can imagine it. He looks around again. There’s something big covered by a bright blue tarp off to the right.

“Mine?” he asks, nodding his chin to it, and Sam nods.

“Yup. I’ve got the rough shapes mostly worked out, but I’m being thorough. I hope that’s okay?”

“That’s fine,” Steve replies easily, and tries not to but asks, “Because I’m Captain America?”

“Well,” Sam starts after a small pause, “That’s part of it. I won’t lie and say I didn’t grow up reading about you, that you weren’t part of what inspired me to serve, but it’s also because you’re my friend, and because of what you told me, the way you looked when I saw you in D.C., and here.”

“‘The way I looked’?” Steve asks, looking over, chest warm at the mention of ‘friend’. He doesn’t...really _have_ friends. He’d like Sam to be one, though. He hopes Sam’s one.

Sam looks back, brown eyes studying him. “Yeah,” he answers, “I thought you looked sad, both times. Not exactly something you say to someone you just met, but...I don’t know, you just seemed sad to me, and I want to make something really good for you, especially after you told me what you did.” He pauses. “You deserve to have good in your life, Steve, you know that, right?”

Steve stares. Swallows. He drags his eyes away from Sam’s earnestly unreadable gaze. 

“Maybe,” he says, a little quiet.

He hasn’t really thought about it. There are things he wants to do and things he doesn’t, things he wants and things he doesn’t want. He hasn’t really been thinking outside of that, if they make him happy or not, if they’re _good_ or not. He hasn’t really thought about things that way since before he woke up from the ice. In the memories he has of Before, the Steve Rogers he was didn’t seem to really think much that way either, and he didn’t let himself have the good thing he wanted, out of fear.

Steve pushes his gloved hands into his jacket pockets.

He feels a little like he’s stealing from that Steve by wanting Bucky, by _letting_ himself want Bucky. Bucky said he didn’t care if Steve remembered or not, but would Steve’s past self care? Would Bucky’s?

Does it matter?

This is why Steve didn’t want to go with Bucky. He is who he is now, there are no more memories to be gained. It’s pointless to wonder, he’ll never get an answer. Isn’t he enough as he is? Maybe he’s even improving where his past self couldn’t, or he wouldn’t. Would his past self have ever told Bucky how he felt? Would he have bought a house in the country and tried to find happiness just by trying to live his life day by day, moment to moment? Or would he have kept quiet and never told Bucky anything while he suffered in silence, bending and bending and giving everything to this country and the world and its shady governments and organizations until he finally snapped and broke, or maybe realized how corrupt it is like _he_ did and broke. Death at his own hands, suicide by honor and bad habits, dying alone inside with the world’s loneliest, most taken for granted heart. Maybe second to Bucky.

Would it be the _same_ for Bucky?

Steve shudders on his way out of the barn and knows it isn’t because of the cold.

He doesn’t want either of them to live that way.

Sam chains up the barn doors and the key turns in the lock with a _click,_ like a period.

\--

Steve stays over for dinner, munching on the couch with Sam while a benign movie plays on Netflix. He leaves after helping with the dishes, and Whiskers even rubs up against his ankles while he’s trying to put his shoes on.

“Guess you’ve been inducted,” Sam jokes.

Steve just smiles back before heading out. “Goodnight, Sam.”

“Goodnight, Steve,” Sam replies, smiling back.

Three weeks later and Steve’s surging up out of bed, sprinting for the bathroom. He barely gets the toilet lid flipped up in time before he’s emptying his stomach into it, not that there’s much _to_ empty. It still gives it its best try, though. He flips the lid down, flushing the toilet and heading over to the sink to wash his hands and wash out his mouth, rubbing over his sore stomach with a hand.

“Well, that wasn’t fun,” he says to the bathroom at large. Maybe he should get a cat just for someone to talk to when he’s not with Sam. Or a dog.

The nausea persist until he gets to Sam’s, something sweet and calming hitting his nose as soon as he’s in the door. He scents the air while toeing his shoes off and closing the door behind him.

“What is that?” he asks.

Sam looks quizzical for a moment before his expression clears. “Oh, that. Lavender incense with a little Wisteria. I put it together myself since the store bought incense smell...well, store bought. Scent’s a lot clearer to me this way. You like it?” he asks, shuffling through to the kitchen. Steve follows him.

“Yeah,” he replies, closing his eyes for a moment and taking in a big whiff, letting it out on a long sigh. “Smells like I’m rolling in a meadow. It’s helping my stomach, too.”

“Caught something?” Sam asks. His heartbeat’s steady and he sounds genuinely concerned. 

Steve relaxes more. “No, I don’t think so,” he answers, “Might’ve just been something I ate.” He rubs his stomach again, letting out a slow breath. Maybe.

“Here, I’ll put a pouch together for you,” Sam says, pulling open a cabinet next to the corner above the counter. Steve blinks, coming around a bit to take a look.

“You don’t have to,” he says.

“Hey, if it helps, it helps,” Sam returns, “I can always order more. The ingredients are easy to come by.”

Steve sniffs again. “Cinnamon?”

Sam grins over his shoulder from where he’s pulling down a few of the- _million_ labeled bottle from the cupboard. “You’ve got a good nose. I use it to help balance out the sweetness.”

Steve shrugs, smiling noncommittally. “You’ve got a lot of-...” he nods his chin to the cupboard.

“Yeah,” Sam replies, leaving it open while he pulls open a drawer below it and pulls out a small, black, velvet bag, “I like incense, helps keep me focused and grounded sometimes. Helps me sleep, too,” he adds, “Might help you, if you’re having any problems with that.”

Steve nods a little, giving a small non-smile. “Sometimes.”

It’s hard to tell beneath all of the different smells gently curling out of the cupboard, but Sam smells a little more earth-spiced than usual again. Maybe one of these days, Steve’ll ask him about that.

For now, he walks back around and takes a slow seat at the counter and watches Sam measure out the different scents he’s gathered with small spoons, expression calmly focused. Steve rests his jaw in his hands, elbows on the counter, pushing his dangling bangs out of his face. His hair’s getting longer, proof of his passing of time.


	23. October

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm uploading two chapters so be on the lookout for the next one, too.

Steve stares at the ceiling, fingers twitching for a cigarette. He closes his eyes and breathes the lavender mix in deep. He doesn’t crave nicotine, not with the way his body works, but the habit is still there, knockin’ at his knuckles. He’ll release it eventually; it just takes time.

He rolls over onto his side, reaching over to tap at his laptop fingerpad, switching to the last browser tab. Bucky’s face stares back, young and war worn like in Steve’s memory. It’s the closest he could find to how Bucky looks now without googling ‘Winter Soldier’. He wouldn’t be surprised if S.H.I.E.L.D. or Hydra could track him down that way somehow, and besides, the odds of anything even popping up are slim. Hydra might be full of assholes, but unfortunately, they’re not sloppy.

He sighs, staring at the photo, tracing every sepia line, patch of stubble, every zigzag in Bucky’s irises before forcing himself up and out of bed. His stomach doesn’t do a somersault when he’s vertical this time, which helps, at least.

October’s finally rolled around. Steve’s never experienced it before, so when he and Sam get into town an hour later, Steve’s surprised by all of the decorations that seem to have sprung up since the last time he was here. There’s even more pumpkins littering shop windows, paper ghosts, black cats. Sam hasn’t stopped grinning since they pulled into town.

They head for the coffee shop first, ‘Shark’s’, as has become their tradition. Steve realized two weeks back that he could customize his order, within reason, so he orders a hot chocolate with cinnamon while Sam pounces on another pumpkin spice latte. He hasn’t ordered anything else every single time they’ve been in here.

Sam gives him a side-eye at his order.

“I’ve been in the mood for hot chocolate,” Steve defends, “I am in the mood for the ice cream, too, though.”

Sam’s grin returns full force.

There’s been less and less eyes on them the more they come in, same with being in town in general. Steve’s not sure if they were staring because he was new or if they were trying to figure out if he was Captain America or both, but the prickling sense of being watched has gradually eased. It makes it easier for him to relax. That, and he still carries the shield in its bag on his back, purposefully square instead of round to make the shape less obvious.

They collect their drinks from the smiling barista at the counter and find a place to sit. By mutual agreement, they take a corner table at the wall length booth in the back.

Steve tries to take a sip of his hot chocolate to stall bringing up his internal debate and even _he_ burns his tongue, jerking his head back quick.

“So...Sam,” he starts after the burn has settled into an aching ebb. Sam glances up, cup lid in hand and in the middle of blowing on his latte, lips pursed and eyebrows rising in question. “I don’t...What does a present day Halloween entail?” Steve makes himself ask, taking in all of the little decorations: small, real pumpkins he can tell by smell up on the shelves, black, orange, red, and yellow colors everywhere, black candles, and even a few fake spiders perched on high up ledges, a few plastic, black cauldrons.

“You don’t- Oh,” Sam cuts himself off. Steve looks back. “Well,” Sam continues, taking a moment to think, “There’s the big thing: trick or treating. People, especially kids, go door to door asking for candy. There’s games, like bobbing for apples where you stick your face in a barrel full of water and try to get an apple with your mouth without using your hands.” Steve raises an eyebrow and Sam shrugs. “There’s parties, hay rides with horses and wagons, depending on where you live, gatherings, staying up late watching horror movies, eating a lot of junk food.”

Steve glances down at his drink between his gloved hands, considering. The heat seeping through them feels good. He looks back up. “You got any plans?”

Sam hums with a shrug. “Kinda. Any of that sound appealing?”

“Well, since I’ve got Netflix now, might just stay in and do the movie thing,” Steve answers.

“We could see what the town’s up to?” Sam asks.

Steve hums consideringly, finally taking a slow sip of his drink.

They could. His stomach’s been settling down around noon, so as long as it’s nothing before then, he should be okay to be out and around.

“We usually have a harvest festival,” one of the baristas chimes in nearby, wiping down a noticeably clean tabletop, Steve spots, “Hay rides, hay maze, games, music. We do a food drive as optional admission every year.” She smiles over at them while Seve takes another sip, listening to her heartbeat. It’s a little fast, and she smells...nervous? Anxious? And…

Steve blinks.

Attracted to something. Someone?

“Really? Maybe we’ll stop by,” Sam replies with a smile, looking to Steve briefly with his eyebrows raised in question. Steve notices her look at Sam and her heartbeat kicks up faster, a faint scent of spiced sweat on the air, different from how Sam usually smells.

Steve’s lips curl up a little against the rim of his cup.

“What time does it start?” Sam asks.

“Four pm,” she answers, “Goes ‘till nine. Feel free to come by. I’m helping set up the maze this year and I’m determined to make it as confusing as possible.” She raises a fist with a grin and Sam lets out a low laugh.

“That’s definitely tempting,” he replies honestly.

Her cheeks pinken.

“ _Lindy!_ ” someone calls from the kitchen.

“ _Coming!_ ” she calls back, looking back to them. “Gotta go,” she says, mostly to Sam before flitting away, blonde curls bouncing just past her shoulders. Steve grins at Sam when Sam looks over.

“What?” Sam asks, “I’m cute.”

“She certainly thinks so,” Steve teases against the edge of his cup. Sam straightens, looking prim, and kicks at him gently under the table. Steve thinks of Peggy Carter for a moment and still manages to smile.

\-----

Steve spends the next week researching Halloween, or ‘All Hallows Eve’? ‘Samhain’? The deeper he gets, the stranger, and sometimes darker, it seems to get.

Somehow, in all of that, he ends up staring at ridiculous costumes at Sam’s kitchen counter with Whiskers curled up against his forearm while Sam puts together a ‘pumpkin pie’, humming all the while.

“They have costumes of me,” Steve half-mumbles to Whiskers and himself, making a small face. He looks to her, but she appears to be sleeping. He huffs a breath.

 _She’s got the right idea_ , he muses.

“Have you looked at the sexy ones yet?” Sam asks, pulling together his ingredients. Steve drags his mouse up with his left forefinger and goes to the section, double clicking. He’s surprised Sam still hasn’t asked why he only ever takes off his left glove.

Steve leans back a little once the section of costumes loads, frowning. He hears a _click_ and looks up to find Sam grinning behind his phone, pointed at Steve.

“ _Worth it_ ,” Sam sing-songs.

Steve sighs, looking back to the webpage. “For you,” he replies, “These look...cold.”

“Oh, they are,” Sam replies, “My sister did the whole ‘sexy nurse’ thing a few years back. She was shivering half the night.”

“Why?” Steve asks, frowning, puzzled.

“His name was ‘Gorgeous Wayne’,” Sam replies, pulling out a mixer from a bottom cabinet, “And then there was Lucinda. She called her Lucy. Maid outfit worked that year. They’re still together,” Sam finishes with a smile.

Steve can’t help smiling back, though it feels bittersweet. He wonders what Bucky would go as, if he was here. He perks up out of his thoughts when he catches a sound, looking over to the nearest window. It’s starting to rain lightly.

The mixer turns on loud and abrupt and he and Whiskers both jump. She takes off down the counter while Sam laughs, half bent over and phone in his hand. Steve grabs one of the small marshmallows from the open bag in front of his laptop and throws it at him. Sam just cracks up harder.

\--

“You planning to dress up?” Sam asks a little while later, after the pies are in the oven and they’ve moved to the living room. The house is slowly starting to smell like pumpkin. Steve takes in a deep breath through his nose.

He shakes his head after a moment. “I got enough of that before I came here. Are you?”

Sam makes a noncommittal sound, reaching for his tea on the coffee table and taking a sip. “Maybe. Only for a few hours though. I don’t have the kidly stamina I used to. I don’t think either of us have to worry about trick-or-treaters showing up this far out either. So, might just dress up for going into town.”

“You wanna go together?” Steve asks.

“Of course!” Sam lets out, grinning, “You’re my best friend out here.”

“ _Only_ out here?” Steve tries to tease, chest and cheeks warm. He’s never had a _best friend_ before, that he can really remember. The memories of Bucky from Before are forever patchy.

“We’re getting there,” Sam replies with a mysterious smile, leaning over to bump their shoulders together.

Steve’s smile stretches.

He turns his laptop a little away from Sam and opens up the picture of Bucky he saved, one of them, while Sam gets Netflix started. He closes it and his laptop when Sam settles back a little more into the couch, leaning forward to set it on the coffee table next to his drink.

“Now. I am going to educate you on the few Halloween movie classics that Netflix currently has available,” Sam declares.

Steve grabs his glass of water and settles back into the couch, too. “Ready when you are,” he says.

Sam smirks and starts something called _Halloween_ , which seems a little on the nose, but appropriate.

\--

Steve catches Sam glancing over at him every so often, Whiskers curled up in his lap, but Steve doesn’t scream, or jump. After _Halloween_ , Sam starts something called _Final Destination_ _Four_ , eyes staying on him for longer until Steve finally looks back.

“Alright,” he says, “I’ll admit this is sending a little bit of a chill down my spine and making me uncomfortable, but...alien invasion,” he finishes.

Sam glances up in thought, makes a considering sound, and then concedes with a nod and a sigh. “Yeah.” He pulls up something called _Werewolf in London_ next and Steve frowns when he thinks of Carter, the memory flashing across his mind like lightning.

He focuses a bit more.

After, Sam asks, “What did you think?”

All Steve can think to say is, “The blood was too bright.”

\--

Steve starts nodding off around eleven and Sam seems to be faring about the same, so Steve makes himself get up and go home, Sam all but ordering him to come back tomorrow for pie. Steve smiles and nods, crouching down to finally let himself rub his fingers over Whisker’s head butting at his ankles.

The rain let up halfway through _The Grudge_ , so the drive back isn’t too bad. Still, Steve takes it carefully.

He curls up in bed that night and dreams of _blood_ and _teeth_ and _Bucky_.

\-----

Halloween steadily edges closer and the next time Steve and Sam roll into town a week before it, every shop is even _more_ decorated than the last time.

They both came for groceries this time, but they make their ritual stop at Shark’s. Steve pauses a step in the door and stares up towards the ceiling where there’s little paper ghosts, cats, pumpkins, and cauldrons now hanging from it.

“Hey there!” Lindy pipes up from behind the counter, smiling so hard it looks like her cheeks might hurt, “Like’em?”

“I don’t know about him, but _I_ do,” Sam answers, heading for the counter, “Should be like this _all_ year.”

Steve slowly follows behind him, door _twinkling_ shut while his eyes slowly take in all of the different ones. No two seem to be the same. One cat has bright green eyes, one yellow, same with the cauldron bubble colors. Even the ghosts have different faces. Steve’s fingers twitch. He kind of wants to draw them.

He vaguely listens to Sam and Lindy chatting, stilling when one of the older regulars pushes up out of his chair and heads straight towards him. Steve tenses, angling his body a little away. The man offers his hand out and Steve blinks, subtly scenting the air, Sam and Lindy’s voices gone quiet.

“My uncle served in the 106th,” the man says. He smells of coffee and engine oil, thick and bitter smells that come together in a clash in Steve’s nose. “I just wanted you to know that we all know who you are, and we don’t plan on makin’ a fuss of it. You can keep hidin’ under the cap and glasses, it’s up to you, but you’re welcome here. I thought you should know.”

Steve stares, a little taken aback. He doesn’t shake the man’s hand, but the man doesn’t seem offended. He just smiles, honest and rough like the rest of him. Steve can smell it in the coffee and oil. He means what he says.

“Mr. Thomas,” Lindy says softly behind him.

“Thank you,” Steve says quietly.

The man nods and goes back to his seat and his coffee, and that’s...that.

Steve looks over and Sam smiles warmly back, slowly relaxing, then turns to Lindy and orders one pumpkin spice latte and one hot chocolate to go.

Steve keeps his hat and glasses on when they leave, when they drive to the store, when they do their grocery shopping, cart next to cart, but he looks at the town differently. It starts to seem less like the idea of a place he might one day feel settled in, and more like it _will_ be a place he can settle in. He relaxes a little more, though he keeps his guard up, but feels...a little more like it might really be home someday, like he might belong.

He and Sam head to their respective homes after, and Steve heads over to Sam’s after he’s done unloading and putting away his groceries to spend the rest of the day eating pies and watching Halloween movies. Sam doesn’t say anything about earlier, and Steve realizes he actually feels the most comfortable with him, maybe in part because Sam _doesn’t_ say anything, or ask questions. Maybe that should put him more on edge than anything, but it doesn’t, it just...makes him feel comfortable. Aside from being at his own house or with Bucky, Sam’s is the most comfortable place he can ever remember being.

His own house is still incomplete, still feels and looks a little too much like he just bought it even though he’s been there going on- two months now, he realizes with a small jolt. He needs to finish putting it together. For himself, for Bucky.

\-----

Halloween eventually arrives. Steve pauses on his way out the door, an idea slowly popping up in his mind like a growing seedling bursting from the ground, and pulls his phone out, using the black surface as a mirror. He slowly makes his eyes glow in its reflection, slipping his phone back into his pocket once he’s satisfied and grabbing the bag of canned foods he’s collected by the doorway. He heads over to Sam’s and arrives just before three, knocking on the door.

“ _Come in!_ ” Sam yells from...somewhere in the house. Towards the back somewhere. Steve lets himself in and closes the door behind him, waiting. Whiskers comes bounding down the hall like he’s armed with cat food instead of human food and Steve crouches down to rub his fingers across her head, down her back before standing back up with a smile and leaning a little towards the hall.

“ _Sam?_ ” he calls down it, focusing his hearing. He hasn’t been that deep into Sam’s house, and he’s not sure if he’s welcome that far in. He’s starting to come and go from Sam’s place like it’s his own, but...well, Steve doesn’t want to infringe on his privacy.

“ _One sec!_ ” Sam calls back, so Steve waits, shifting his bag to hold it with both hands in front of himself and glancing down with another smile when Whiskers rubs up against his ankles. He hears more steps in no particular pattern, then hears them approaching and looks back up.

Sam pops out of a room at the end of the hall, machete in hand and mask over his face. Steve tenses before he can help himself, fingers twitching around the food bag handles for the shield bag on his back.

“Sam?” he asks, frowning, because Steve can smell him just fine, and the machete looks...plastic, upon closer inspection, “What are you dressed as?”

“Jason,” Sam says, pushing the mask up to reveal his grinning face, coming to a stop in front of the short, door hall, “ _Friday the 13th_. We didn’t get to it.”

“Ahh,” Steve replies, and Sam blinks and comes closer.

“Wow, your eyes look cool,” he says, leaning in a bit, “Contacts? Really _good_ contacts.”

Steve smirks a little. “Yup,” he replies. It’s risky, making his eyes glow in public, but he didn’t want to put on a costume, and it’s the easiest alternative. He can just pretend to take out his ‘contacts’ if he gets tired of it.

“Cool,” Sam grins again, “You ready to go?”

“Yup,” Steve replies, holding up the bag of canned food. Sam’s eyebrows rise as he holds up a finger before he darts into the kitchen, coming back out with a full bag of his own.

“Let’s go,” he says, and Steve turns back for the door, giving Whiskers one last pet.

\--

They have to stop at Shark’s to ask Cecilia, the other barista, for directions to the festival since it doesn’t appear to be directly in town. She directs them to a field behind the local farmer’s market area next to the grocery store on the other end of town. He and Sam arrive ten minutes early, but there’s already a dozen or more cars parked in the gravel leading up to the tall, Autumn yellow grass.

Sam parks his car in a spot closest to the way they came in and pulls his mask back down before they get out and head up the small hill, canned food bags in hand. There’s a small table set up to the left at the top of the hill and they hand them off to the older woman seated there. She collects them with a smile, pressing little stamps to the backs of their hands after Steve takes off his left glove.

“Lovely eyes, dear,” she comments, and gives Sam a thumbs up at his costume that Sam returns. Steve can tell he’s grinning beneath the mask.

True to Lindy’s word, there’s an elaborate looking, seven foot high hay maze straight ahead, a series of games and handmade game stands to the left of it, and what looks like food and drinks stands to the right. Lindy herself seems to be dressed up as a witch in all black, guarding the entrance to the maze. She waves her hand up high as soon as she spots them.

“ _Hey, guys!_ ” she calls as they head over, “Wow! Sam! Great costume! And your eyes, Steve!”

Steve smiles while Sam gets almost as ecstatic about hers.

“I love yours, too! Nice hat,” he adds, pushing his mask back up.

Steve watches them talk for a moment after they meet up before looking around, lips still curled up. There’s children running around dressed like ghosts and fairies, cats, rabbits, superheroes. Steve pulls his phone out of his pocket and takes a quick picture of small Iron Man chasing a princess nearby and texts it to Tony.

 

_I feel bad for Ms. Potts_

 

He gets a reply back almost immediately.

 

_ill have u know SHE chased ME_

_also omg thats cute where r u i need to upgrade his repulsors asap sending the pic 2 Pepper_

 

Steve cracks a smile at his phone before pausing when he feels eyes on him, looking around, then down, blinking when he finds a little Natasha staring up at him.

 _Of all the costumes_ , he thinks wryly.

“Pretty,” she says, staring up at his eyes. Steve looks around, sees Sam glance over at him with a smile before going back to talking to Lindy, so Steve crouches down, careful to be slow.

“Wanna see a trick?” he asks quietly, almost a whisper. The little girl nods, auburn curls bouncing gently around her cheeks.

Steve looks around one more time and then closes his eyes, taking away the glow and then opening them. Her eyes widen a little. He closes them again and puts it back, opens them and her eyes widen further with a gasp. After a moment that has Steve sweating a little nervously under her stare, her mouth slowly widens into a huge smile.

“Cool!” she lets out, jumping up and down.

Steve brings a finger to his mouth. “Our secret,” he says, still hushed, and she nods her head emphatically.

“ _Samantha!_ ” a woman calls, and the little girl turns sharply, then looks back.

“Byebye,” she says quickly, waving and then bringing a finger up to her mouth with a, “ _Shhh_ ,” before taking off, curls bouncing. Steve slowly stands with a smile, watching her go.

“Making pacts with four year olds,” Sam says, and Steve jumps, looking over his shoulder and feeling caught. Sam shakes his head, but he’s smiling. “Best kind.”

Steve’s lips twitch up into a smile and then Sam tugs him into the maze with a brief wave at Lindy.

They come back out twenty minutes later to anticipation written all over her face and Sam gives her a thumbs up. She bounces once with her fists clenched up near her chest and grins victoriously.

\--

They head back to Sam’s after where Steve ‘takes out his contacts’ while Sam’s in his bedroom changing out of his costume. Sam heads into the kitchen dressed in sweats and comes back out of it a few moments later with the second pie and a can of whip cream. Steve laughs quietly, nodding over the back of the couch.

They stay up until midnight and decimate the whole pie _and_ the can of whip cream while watching the _Friday the 13th_ movies, which are probably Steve’s least favorite of the bunch, but Sam seems to be really rooting more for Jason than the teenagers, which is amusing.

Afterwards, Steve heads home with a final scritch to Whisker’s chin and a yawn to brush his teeth and shower quick, then slip into bed. He stares up at the ceiling for a few minutes, a slow smile making its away across his face, and rolls onto his side. He slides his finger over the laptop fingerpad to wake it up where it’s perched where a second pillow would go, squinting against the light and opening his favorite saved picture of Bucky.

Steve stares at it until he falls asleep, wondering if Bucky would have had fun today. Steve thinks he would’ve.

\-----

In a little town outside Prague, Bucky blows smoke out from where he’s perched on a windowsill, watching the sun slowly rise up over the city’s horizon in the distance. He drags his eyes back down to the worn journal in his lap and slips the cigarette back between his lips, writing something down on rough paper.

 

 _Cigarettes don’t taste as good without your lips having been on them first_.

 _I miss you_.

_Happy Halloween, Steve_

 

He looks at it for a long moment before closing the journal with the pen tucked between the pages, tying the journal shut and stowing it in his duffel, slinging the whole thing over his shoulder. He stubs his cigarette out against the heel of his boot and heads for the door, checking that he has all his guns and knives in place on the way out.

His long bangs block the sun from his face when it finally reaches him, and his face from the world as he starts out on the road again.


	24. November

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter one.

The weather feels like it gets colder faster at the start of November. Steve doesn’t need to, but he starts wearing his jacket around more, and even starts looking online for... _alternatives_. He doesn’t need to do that either, he has the clothes he packed with him before he left his apartment and it’s enough to sustain him, but he... _wants_ to.

He buys a new jacket, a few oversized hoodies, some sweatshirts, more sweatpants, another pair of jeans, soft looking socks (per Sam’s recommendation), and a bunch of large sweaters. Everything he has is on the tight side, which is fine, he likes it, but...well, he wants to try something different, so he buys a few different sizes.

When they come in, he pulls each one on over his head, trying them on, stopping and focusing on the last large sweater while he rubs his fingers against the hem. It feels...good, soft, less like a cage and more like he’s a giant pillow.

He does a quick spin and the material gently _poofs_ out before falling back into place, weighted by itself. Steve’s lips twitch faintly. He likes it, feeling softer than a confused blade with nowhere to point and nothing to slash and stab, at least not yet. He’s still expecting S.H.I.E.L.D. to find him, or Hydra, maybe even the hunters, so he trains with his shield in the barn sometimes when he’s not at Sam’s or with him, but...for now, he just…

 _Please, let me be soft_ , Steve thinks, with maybe a tinge of desperation, _Please just let me **be**_.

He heads over to Sam’s, as has become his erratic routine, and knocks on the door. As much as Steve comes over, he’s not sure if he should ask about letting himself in. The thought of Sam doing that at his place puts him on edge. Even the thought of Bucky just walking in kind of puts him on edge.

Sam answers the door with a, “Hey, man,” looking a little surprised, eyes roaming down then back up, “Well this is new.”

“Thought I’d try something more...relaxed,” Steve replies, stepping in after Sam opens the door wider for him.

“It’s a good look on you,” Sam says, closing the door and heading into the kitchen. Steve follows after getting his shoes off, lips curling up.

“I’m not sure about my hair,” Steve replies, taking his usual seat at the counter and reaching up to fiddle a little with his bangs. They’re long enough that they dip down past his ears, now, the rest laying gently against the back of his neck in light layers

Whiskers hops up on the counter and Steve lets the strands go, resting his arm on the granite and spreading his fingers out for her to sniff and rub her face against. Steve chuckles.

“Eh,” Sam replies with a shrug, shoulder deep in another cabinet across the kitchen, “Whatever you wanna do. It’s your hair. I think you look fine.” He comes back up with a metal cake pan or three and Steve raises his eyebrows. Sam looks over, then back at the pans. “Yeeah, Thanksgiving’s coming up and I wanna try something new,” he explains as he sets the cake pans on the counter.

“Thanksgiving?” Steve asks, frowning. Another holiday?

“Oh! Right,” Sam lets out, heading for and pulling the fridge door open, “Sorry. I swear I’m not forgetting on purpose. I just got caught up in the.” He pauses to gesture vaguely towards the pans. “My ma emailed me last night too, asking about my plans. I’ve been distracted.”

“You’re going to go see your mother for Thanksgiving?” Steve tries to piece together. He’s not sure what it is, but if it’s a holiday, maybe people spend it with friends or family?

“Might,” Sam replies, setting some ingredients out on the counter, “I’m not sure if I’m going _there_ , or if she’s coming _here_.” He looks up and Steve looks back, trying not to look as confused as he feels. He pulls his phone out of his pants pocket after a moment and wakes the screen, pulling up his browser and tapping in the search bar:

_Thanksgiving definition_

Steve frowns a little at the search results, leaning his cheek in his hand, elbow on the counter, Whiskers curling up near it. “So...a celebration of God, and or a ‘harvest celebration’ with turkey?” he asks, looking up for clarification.

“Oh, its origin is a lot darker than that,” Sam replies, pulling out his mixer, “Some English settlers showed up in America and shared food with the people who were here first, were born here, then basically brought the plague and took their land before oppressing them.”

Steve makes a face, frowning at him while Sam comes over and leans his hip against the opposite side of the counter, watching him. Steve shakes his head a little, expression somewhere between scrunched up in disgust and _confused_. “And people _celebrate_ that?”

“Well, I don’t think everyone actually knows how bad it actually is,” Sam replies, arms crossed, “For my family, we just think of it as family gathering time and a few free days off.”

Steve watches him go back to his ingredients, pulling out a measuring cup. “I think I liked Halloween better,” he says, and Sam snorts a dry laugh.

“Yeah, that one’s got some issues too, but I think Thanksgiving might take the cake,” he replies, “Speaking of, care to be my taste tester today?”

“Sure,” Steve answers, closing out of his browser and shutting off his phone screen, slipping it back into his pocket.

\-----

Steve doesn’t change on the next full moon either, but he does run again, makes sure to change into his older clothes so the new ones don’t get dirty. The older jeans and t-shirts are easier to wash the blood and dirt out of.

He chases three deer and kills one, efficient and quick. He carries it to his barn around three am and closes the main doors, but opens the upper level half-door, working by passing moonlight. His claws make quick work of skinning, disemboweling, and cutting. He burns the extra full moon energy off by making long-quick trips out into the forest to dispose of everything he won’t eat (and if he licks his fingers off on the way back, eats some of the raw meat before he gets it cleaned off and packed away in his freezer, no one’s going to know. He can’t hear anything but animal souls for a mile all around).

Steve scrubs the blood out of his clothes that he can in the tub before throwing them in the washer and taking a shower. He turns his face up to the spray and closes his eyes, opens his mouth, spits out animal blood against porcelain white and scrubs the red and dirt off of his hands, forearms, feet, between his fingers and toes, under all sets of his nails, the mess of it swirling swiftly down the tub drain.

He shivers when the cool air hits his wet skin as he steps out, shoving his bangs out of his face and pausing naked in front of the mirror.

His eyes are still glowing a soft blue, made even brighter by the contrast of his dark, wet hair. He thinks of Bucky’s, how they look almost white when they glow, like the first bright rays of sunlight in winter, on snow, and tries to focus past the _longing_ that beats in his chest like a living thing, a rabbit thumping in his ribcage, a long, lone, mournful howl at the moon.

Maybe it’s a good thing he didn’t shift. He’s not sure how his neighbours would handle hearing a wolf out here, especially if they’ve got children, and he doesn’t want to scare Sam. Steve just officially got accepted in town, he doesn’t want to ruin that.

He quickly cleans up the dirt on his floor, then messes around on his laptop until the washer’s done, shoving everything into the dryer and starting it before letting himself go to bed. He curls up into a ball in the middle of it under the covers, staring at saved pictures of Bucky on his phone, screen light turning the dark blue sheets bright. He nods off before it goes dark.

\-----

Steve can feel Sam eyeing him across the counter even though he’s focused on playing pinball on his laptop.

“Is it just me,” Sam starts, the whole kitchen smelling of vanilla today, “Or have you lost some weight?”

“Well,” Steve says after losing his third ball, starting another round, “Feed me, Sam.” He can actually feel how unimpressed Sam gets, nevermind smell it.

“Do I look like Seymour to you?” Sam asks.

Steve taps his spacebar to pause the game and looks up, pretending to think about it and throwing in a considering hum just to make Sam’s eyebrows tick up higher.

“You,” Sam says, pointing at him, “Are an ass. Captain America is an ass. You are ruining my childhood Steve,” he deadpans.

Steve grins. “You get your Thanksgiving plans sorted out?” he asks after Sam’s gone back to gathering ingredients for...something, putting them in and taking them out of some grouping order only Sam seems to make sense of.

“Yeah. They’re coming here,” Sam answers after a moment, looking up, “You’re invited too, y’know.”

Steve stills, looking back up from his game. He loses his first ball down the gutter, but can’t even worry a little about it. “I…” he says eloquently. Sam just raises a brow, lips tugging up on one side. “I don’t know,” Steve says eventually, “Do they know about me?” Shit. He hadn’t even thought about that.

“They know I have a friend up here, but they don’t know who or what your name is,” Sam answers, getting out another cake pan. He’s been on a cake making roll for the last three days, and they’ve all tasted spectacular. Steve only has a quarter of one of the halves Sam sent home with him left.

Steve relaxes again while Sam starts measuring out ingredients into the mixer, catches a whiff of lavender and closes his eyes to inhale it deeper, humming softly on the exhale at the way it mixes with the smell of the vanilla. He catches Sam’s scent underneath, too, earth-spiced and pleased.

“I don’t know,” Steve says again. He’s not sure he’d be comfortable with it, being in close, familial proximity with others for an extended amount of time. He loves being with and around Sam, but he doesn’t know or trust Sam’s family.

He blinks, quietly stunned.

He trusts Sam.

...Maybe he _should_ get to know his family, too?

“Well, let me know whatever you decide,” Sam says easily, “We’re definitely going to have plenty of food.”

Steve manages a smile, going back to his game when the mixer turns on. Whisker’s head comes up and then she hops off the counter, and practically _sashays_ out of the kitchen, tail sticking straight up at them. Steve snorts a laugh and Sam gives her rear end an unimpressed look that rivals the one he gave Steve.

\-----

November steadily gets colder as the days wear by. Steve wonders about Bucky. They were both so cold for so long...he hopes Bucky’s warm right now, wherever he is. Maybe he’s on his way here? Maybe he’s trying to track Steve down?

Steve shakes his head a little and lets the thoughts go, taking a sip of one of the teas he finally let Sam give him. It goes down smooth, aroma calming and flavor bursting as it unravels across his tongue, liquid warming his belly.

If he thinks thoughts like that about Bucky, however much longer he isn’t here is just going to be miserable (and Steve’s not going to entertain the thought that he won’t ever be here, for any reason).

He curls up a little more in the cozy corner of his couch, watching the leaves slowly change colors in the trees outside his windows, ensconced snugly in his warm living room. He can’t see all of the minute color shifts, but he can see some of them. It passes the time away.

\-----

He declines going to Sam’s for Thanksgiving.

“I’m going to stay home,” Steve decides gently, sipping another tea, this time curled up in the corner of Sam’s couch instead of his own, “I’m not...ready to be around anyone else like that yet.”

“That’s cool,” Sam replies easy, a steaming mug of his own between his hands. He smiles. “I’m glad you’re comfortable enough in my presence.”

Steve smiles back, only feeling a tiny bit guilty and a lot warm. He hasn’t told Sam everything, but he wants to, just...not yet.

 _A little longer_ , he thinks, _And maybe I’ll tell him about the other things._

\-----

Steve sprints for the bathroom the morning before Thanksgiving, managing to reach the toilet this time. He missed it yesterday. He picks up the sound of tires slowly rolling across gravel and spits one last time before closing the lid and flushing, washing his hands then brushing his teeth. He takes a minute to be a little more thorough, only spitting in the sink when he hears a car stop. He rinses his mouth out, cleans and puts his toothbrush away, then quickly throws on his gloves and some loose, comfy clothes to the sound of knocking on his front door, jogging to it like he just heard that someone arriving.

Sam’s on the other side of the glass when Steve gets there, armed with-

Steve blinks as he opens the door, about twelve different smells hitting him all at once, almost all mouthwatering (would be more so if his stomach wasn’t still rolling a bit).

Food?

“Sam,” Steve lets out, surprised. Sam smiles and steps in when Steve takes a few back, opening the door wider for him.

“You’re not coming over for Thanksgiving, so I thought I’d bring some of it to you,” Sam explains, offering a few of the bags to Steve. Steve quickly reaches for them, heart aching and backs of his eyes stinging.

“Sam…” he trails off quietly, looking down at the bags, back up, “I don’t know what to say.”

Sam smiles, open and warm, and Steve rubs at his eyes with the back of his knuckles when tears start to escape.

“They’re meant for tomorrow,” Sam continues gently, “But if you want, we can both have some the day after. My family has to go back that morning, and I’m definitely going to have plenty of leftovers.”

Steve nods, because his throat is too tight to speak. He nods his head towards the kitchen, rubbing at his eyes again, and Sam toes his shoes off before they both head in that direction.

“I don’t-...” Steve tries, clearing his throat roughly while setting the bags on the counter, “I don’t have any family. I can barely remember my mom, and...Bucky’s not here.” He clears his throat again, but the tears just keep coming. He covers his eyes with the heels of his palms. “This is...this means a lot,” he forces past his closing throat.

“I know,” Sam says gently. Steve sniffs noisily, rubbing at his eyes and lowering his hands to look up. “That’s what friends are for,” Sam finishes.

Steve’s face finally crumples and Sam opens his arms a bit in offering. Steve doesn’t want to say _no_.

He accepts the hug, wrapping his arms around Sam and snuffling, shuddering a little at the feeling of getting hugged _back_. It’s good timing, too, because he can feel his eyes glowing out of control. He manages to reign it in before he has to pull back, and misses the feeling of arms around him already. Maybe he was the touch starved one, maybe him and Bucky both.

Sam’s hand grips his shoulder and Steve jolts a little before leaning into it.

“Thanks,” Steve says, a little ragged. Sam just smiles and then helps him put the food away. Steve still can’t stomach much yet, but they share companionable silence over a couple pieces of Sam’s pumpkin pie before Sam goes back home.

\--

As promised, Sam shows up the next day around two with more food, and they share it while watching something called _Nightmare Before Christmas_ on Netflix. Steve ends up crying again, a little because of the movie, a lot because Sam Wilson is too good to and for him. Sam gives him another hug after they set their dishes down on the coffee table and doesn’t seem to mind Steve sitting a little closer for the rest of the movie, sides of their feet knocking gently down by the table.


	25. December

_I remember terrible things, Steve. These past two months there’s been more. I feel like I’m drowning in a sea of it, viscous oil cloying down my throat and lungs. Thinking of you and finishing this makes it so I can breathe again. I hold onto those thoughts tightly when I wake up and before I go to sleep. Sometimes it makes doing this harder, sometimes all I want is to come find you, but then they’d still be out there, you wouldn’t be safe, I wouldn’t be safe, no one would, and I still wouldn’t have all the answers I’m looking for._

_I’m coming, just give me more time, just a little more of our time._

\-----

He needs to mow the grass.

Steve looks down and shifts his shoes in the three months worth of growth brushing his ankles like Whiskers does when he’s at Sam’s. He turns and looks out across the- his fields. It’s just as long out there.

He pulls his coat a little tighter.

It’s gotten even colder. Winter’s here, he can smell it on the air, feeling it in his bones. At least for now, the grass has stopped growing. He can try mowing it himself before it gets too much colder, but there’s a lot. He didn’t think of that before buying the place.

He brings it up an hour later at Sam’s, hot mug of tea between his gloved hands, sitting at Sam’s counter. 

“I hire someone from town to do mine,” Sam says, frowning while inspecting two baking pans. One’s large and leaf shaped, the other a snowflake. He holds them up and Steve nods his chin towards the leaf. Sam puts the snowflake away. “I’ve got a riding lawnmower and I do what I can, but I haven’t tried to do the whole thing since my first attempt.”

Steve glances up in thought.

He can picture it: Sam sweating a torrent under the August sun while sitting over a motored blade.

“I’ll text you the number,” Sam says, dragging Steve out of his thoughts. He watches Sam gather his usual ingredients, perking up a little when Sam pulls out red sprinkles. That’s new. “They might be able to squeeze you in before they officially close for Winter.”

Steve appreciates him not saying they’d still do it for Captain America regardless. Maybe. Steve’s aware not everyone is a fan, especially after the wikipedia-ing he did. The government and various establishments sure liked throwing his name around while he was in the ice, just about as much as he’s had to throw the shield since waking.

“I think I’ll just leave it ‘til Spring,” Steve says, taking a sip of his tea. He closes his eyes briefly as the flavor settles across his tongue. It tastes like roses smell. “I don’t want anyone to have to spend that long out in the cold on my account.”

“Whatever you decide,” Sam replies, pulling his phone out of his pocket and tapping a few keys. Steve’s chimes and he pulls it out, checking his messages.

_Yardwork_

Followed by a number.

Sam goes back to puttering around.

“Thanks,” Steve says.

“You’re welcome,” Sam returns. Whiskers hops up on the counter and Steve smiles, reaching his fingers out. 

“What are you making?” he asks while she rubs her face against his hand. “You’re doing most of the work for me,” Steve teases her in a mumble.

"Not sure yet,” Sam answers distractedly, “Still willing to taste test?”

Steve glances up, narrowing his eyes. “Not if you sound so ominous.”

“What’s a little potentially upset stomach between friends?” Sam jokes. 

Steve’s lips twitch.

Speaking of…

“Hey, Sam,” he starts after a quiet minute.

“ _Mmhmm?_ ” Sam hums distractedly.

Steve watches him measure out flour for a moment, stroking his fingers down Whisker’s spine where she’s curled up in her now semi-usual spot next to his forearm. 

“Nevermind,” he decides. He’ll tell Sam, soon, but...not right now.

“Alright,” Sam replies easily, still distracted. 

Steve keeps petting Whiskers and takes another sip of his tea to the gentle rumble of her purr vibrating all along his forearm, the both of them content to watch Sam work.

\-----

He spends the next week debating with himself over whether to tell Sam. Well, he _wants_ to tell Sam, so it’s more _how_ to tell him. S.H.I.E.L.D. already knew, Bucky already knew, and Steve can’t ever remember having to tell anyone who didn’t already know, or wasn’t a werewolf, too. Sam will...be his first, maybe ever. To make it even worse, Sam’s his only friend outside of Bucky and out here, and Steve doesn’t want to lose him, or make him mad because Steve’s been technically lying to him the whole time they’ve gotten to know each other. 

Or worse, have Sam call someone because he thinks Steve needs help and invite all sorts of unwanted attention and trouble. 

So...Steve thinks himself in circles, and before he can come up with anything, he gets company.

\-----

Steve pauses in the middle of hanging up a sweatshirt a few days later, catching a sound. It’s coming from outside and it’s strange, the sound of crunching gravel, light and sedate: feet, not tires.

He focuses his hearing.

A heartbeat, thick and steady. Just one, and he doesn’t think it’s Sam’s.

He finishes hanging up his sweatshirt and quickly grabs his shield bag, opening it for the first time in months and pulling the shield out. It gleams bright in the cloud-covered sunlight coming through the windows, quietly loud and out of place in his bedroom where things are soft and comfortable.

He moves to his doorway, out of any sightlines from the windows, and slips the shield onto his forearm. Then he listens and waits, and waits, and waits, until eventually, finally, the steps stop and there’s a knock at his front door.

Steve tenses further, then makes himself relax and slowly heads for the door, shield in front of him. When he gets there, Fury’s on the other side of the glass dressed in dark jeans, a dark jacket, a dark shirt, dark hat, dark everything, hands loosely in his pockets.

Steve reaches out and cautiously turns the doorknob, slowly pulls the door open.

“Afternoon, Cap,” Fury says casually, “Mind if I come in?”

“Yes,” Steve answers immediately, low and tense, “We can talk here.”

Fury shrugs easily, unbothered. “I won’t beat around the bush then. I’ve come to ask you back.”

Steve’s already shaking his head before replying, “No. I’m not coming back.”

Fury watches him for a long moment. “Pierce is being held for multiple counts of terrorism and multiple counts of illegal experimentation.”

Steve frowns, tensing further.

“Don’t worry, we’ve kept the detailed nature of said experiments under wraps. I’m feeding the World Security Council and senate small details to see how they bite,” Fury continues, “Hydra’s stayed hidden long enough. I don’t like the thought of them keeping it up for another seventy years. Which is why I’ve come to see if you’ll come back. We could use your help, Steve,” he says honestly. At least, he _sounds_ honest, voice and heartbeat.

Steve takes in a slow inhale through his nose.

Scent, too.

He shakes his head a little. “No,” he repeats, “I don’t want to get involved anymore. Not with S.H.I.E.L.D., not with Hydra, not with any of it. I think I’ve earned that.”

Fury narrows his eye a little. “If it’s about the reason you left-”

“It’s not just that,” Steve cuts him off, and Fury goes quiet, unreadable. Steve keeps himself from shifting. “I don’t remember everything, and I’m never going to,” he continues, “I went back to being Captain America because was that the only familiar thing I had after waking up, because I wanted to help people and try to find myself. I was doing it out of obligation to memories I’m never going to get back. But ever since I left and I’ve been out here…” he trails off, looking around for a moment. “I think I’ve found more of who I am out here than I ever did working as an Avenger or an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. And I’m grateful to you for waking me up,” he adds, looking back, “For trying to help me get my memories back and assimilate into the world, but that doesn’t mean that I have to keep being Cap, or that I want to.”

Fury’s still unreadable, expression and scent and heartbeat and all, and Steve’s not sure what to do with that.

“I know why you did what you did,” Steve adds, quieter. Fury’s expression pinches minutely. He’s not an uncaring man, Steve knows, far from it. He’s like Stark, in that way. He cares almost _too_ much. That’s why he does everything that he does, so that he can save as many people as he can, just like Captain America, just like the Avengers. Fury _is_ an Avenger. “But the damage is still…”

“Done,” Fury finishes for him with a nod, expression...quiet, “I know.”

They watch each other for a few moments.

“Gotta say, I’m not fond of letting one of my best assets go,” Fury says.

Steve’s lips twitch, despite himself. “You? Easily letting things go?” he jokes quietly.

 _Fury’s_ lips twitch, then his expression sobers. “What about that?” he asks, nodding his chin down. 

Steve panics for a moment, thinks he means something else until he remembers the shield’s in front of him. He tightens his hand around the strap. “What about it?”

“Willing to let it go?” Fury asks, a hint of a playful undertone before he continues seriously, “Give it to the next Cap?”

Steve pauses, staring. “You want to make another?” He’s aware there were others after him, while he was in the ice. They didn’t have this shield, but they were Captain America.

“Maybe,” Fury replies enigmatically, “If I did, might help if the world saw them wielding the ‘mighty shield’.” He raises a brow and Steve tries not to roll his eyes at the reference, much as it throws him off kilter, too, which was probably the point.

“I…” he trails off, looking down at it. He doesn’t remember getting it. He read somewhere that Howard Stark had made it, gave it to him during the war, but Steve doesn’t remember it. Tony must know that, he thinks a little distantly.

Still, even though he doesn’t remember getting it, it feels like it’s...part of him. The thought of giving it up makes him...uneasy, especially now, with everything going on.

“I...No,” he decides, looking back up at Fury, “I won’t do that either. After Hydra’s gone, then...maybe.” But until then, he’d rather have it with him.

Fury watches him for a minute before turning his head to look out at the barn, the lake, the fields of overgrown grass. “You’ve got a nice place here,” he says after a minute.

“You’re bringing trouble to my door with all this,” Steve replies, raising his eyebrows a little. 

Fury looks back. “But you don’t want surveillance, I’m guessing.”

Steve shakes his head, tensing again. “No. You bug any part of my property or station agents here or in town, and I’ll rip their throats out.” His eyes glow and his nails sharpen in his gloves.

Fury watches him. “Understood,” he says after another long minute, then turns to go.

“Just like that?” Steve asks. 

Fury stops and turns to look at him. It almost looks like he wants to smile.

He turns back around and keeps walking. Steve stays tensed in his doorway until Fury’s all the way up his gravel drive, watches him take a left onto the main road and walk out of sight. Steve sees a black car drive by and hears it slow, hears Fury get in and the car take him away, and runs, not even bothering with his front door.

The black car came from the direction of Sam’s house.

\--

“ _Sam!_ ” he lets out as soon as the door opens. Sam takes a few quick steps back as Steve plows through inside, not being as subtle as he should be about scenting the air (and the small part of him not currently sniffing for threats cringes at getting his dirty bare feet all over Sam’s clean floor).

“Steve,” Sam says uncertainly, “Did you _run_ here? You’re-...” he trails off, gaze dropping, “You’re not wearing shoes.”

Steve hums a vague agreement while darting his eyes around, checking the space. He can’t smell any scents but Sam’s and Whisker’s and his own, and some trace amounts lingering from Sam’s family’s Thanksgiving visit. Still, that doesn’t mean it’s clear.

“Did anyone come by asking about me?” he asks, looking back to him. Sam’s widened eyes shift up from the shield.

“No,” he replies, tensing, “Why? Are we in danger?””

Steve relaxes a little. “Not exactly, but can I sweep your place for bugs?” he asks. Sam frowns. “I promise I will explain after.” Because he owes it to Sam, beyond owes it to Sam.

“...Fine. Alright,” Sam agrees, brows lowered while he points at Steve, “But you _are_ explaining after. Especially since you’ll probably be going through my underwear drawer.”

“I swear. I will,” Steve vows. Sam studies him for a long moment and Steve thinks of Fury, then nods. Steve gets to work.

\--

It takes him the better part of two hours. He’s aware of the familiar sounds and smells of Sam baking something while Steve focuses on combing every inch of his house: beneath cushions, furniture, on shelves, behind books and DVDs and CDs, in drawers, under every surface imaginable, making sure to be _very_ careful with Sam’s handmade projects. By the end of it, Steve feels like an invader, but one that can take an easier breath. He sweeps outside of the house, too, and Sam’s car, all of which he’ll have to do again with his own when he gets home.

He heads to Sam’s bathroom to wash his feet off and then makes sure to clean all of Sam’s floors, getting everything spotless before he’s satisfied. It helps assuage some of the guilt.

Steve slowly heads into the kitchen with his metaphorical tail between his legs, after. The smell of pumpkin spice - Sam’s favorite - is abundant, and just makes him feel worse.

“I didn’t find anything,” he reports, subdued. Sam doesn’t say anything, just lifts his electric kettle off its base and pours water into two waiting mugs, steam drifting into the air. He sets one on the opposite side of the counter in front of Steve’s usual seat and blows at the top of the other.

Steve slowly walks over, resting his shield against the tall, chair legs before pulling himself up onto the seat, tugging his mug a little closer, bottom scraping quietly across the granite and heat sinking quickly between his hands, through his gloves. It smells like lavender tea this time. 

Sam still doesn’t say anything, just pulls his own seat over across from Steve on the other side of the counter and sits, waiting, eyes raising to him.

Steve takes in a slow breath full of lavender and just as slowly lets it out, making himself hold Sam’s gaze.

“My boss showed up at my house. Nick Fury,” he states. Sam’s eyes widen fractionally. “He asked for me back, then my shield. I said no,” Steve explains, “The car that picked him up came from the direction of your house and I panicked. I was worried he might have sent someone to harass you, or planted something here to keep an eye on me, but I can’t have him doing that, either of those things.” Steve tightens his grip on his mug. “Not right now. Maybe never again.”

Sam watches him, calm, listening. Steve makes himself take another slow breath to try and calm his rabbit heart. The lavender helps a little. Sam Wilson is a blessing.

“There’s something else I haven’t told you,” Steve continues, “And I’m sorry about that. It’s not something I can just go around telling people. In fact, it’s very dangerous to know, for you and for me, so I need you to tell me if you want me to stop right now. It could dangerously complicate your life.”

Sam takes a slow sip of his tea, looking down at it thoughtfully as his throat works. Steve listens to him swallow. Then Sam looks back up and inclines his head a bit. “I like the peace and quiet I have out here.”

“And I want you to _keep_ that,” Steve blurts, clamping his mouth shut when Sam lifts a hand to ask for him to wait.

“ _But_ ,” Sam continues, “You’re my friend, too. Whatever’s bothering you, I want you to feel comfortable enough that you can tell me if you want. I didn’t exactly sign up for a spy agency being in the package, but I knew it wouldn’t all be easy with you.” He gestures at Steve as a whole with a hand, like that explains it all. It does, really. “So, if I have to dig my guns out, I’ve been prepared to for a while now.”

Steve stares, eyes a little wide, taken aback.

“So,” Sam says, breaking the quiet, still looking at him, “If there’s something you want to tell me, go ahead.”

Steve blinks a few times, stunned. He makes himself take a sip of his tea, focusing on the heat sliding down his throat while trying to rally his thoughts.

“I don’t-...I’ve never had to tell anyone this before,” he starts, looking back up to Sam, who’s still watching him, patient as ever.

 _Saint Sam_ , Steve thinks. He read that he used to be religious Before. As he is now, he’s still not sure what he thinks about religion, but if there is a higher power, it’s surely blessed Sam Wilson.

Steve straightens in his chair and squares his shoulders, steeling himself. “Sam, I’m a werewolf.”

Sam blinks once, staring.

Steve tries not to panic. “Um-”

“Steve-” Sam starts, and Steve can smell the disbelief starting.

“ _Look_ ,” Steve pleads, praying this won’t make it worse. He makes his eyes glow and Sam jerks up out of his chair, ends of it skidding loudly across the kitchen floor, his eyes wide. He doesn’t run, at least.

Steve slowly lets go of his mug and reaches over, keeping his motions obvious. Sam’s eyes drop to the movement and Steve tugs and pulls his right glove off, then his left, keeping his eyes glowing while he slowly holds his hands up for Sam to see.

“I won’t hurt you,” Steve states calmly, “I’m not out of control like in the movies, not even on a full moon. You are not in danger of me.”

Sam keeps staring, eyes shifting between Steve’s own and his hands, _left, middle, right, left, middle, right_. Steve can hear his heart beating a mile a minute. He lets the glow fade out of his eyes. Sam, very slowly, drags his chair back and sits down a little roughly.

“ _This whole time_ ,” he breathes, voice a bit ragged, “Wait, even before the-” Steve nods and Sam lets out a huge breath, sagging a bit with it. “Were...wolf,” he says, sounds like it’s to himself, so Steve doesn’t say anything, just nods again.

“I have been all my life,” he says. 

Sam blinks again.

They sit in silence for a minute. Steve keeps his movements slow and controlled, lowers his hands and takes a sip of his tea, watches Sam’s eyes follow his right like they’re glued to it and tries not to squirm, ignores the discomfort. He can _feel_ Sam’s gaze trace the harsh, misaligned and elongated fingers, the longer, sharp nails, the way the skin never fits quite right over the whole structure.

Steve tries not to fidget. 

Sam finally lifts his mug and takes a long swallow, eyes still locked on Steve’s hand. “Well,” he says roughly, clearing his throat and forcing his eyes up, “In the interest of full disclosure, I’m a witch.”

Steve blinks. He’s not...sure what that is, but it sounds personal. He’ll have to look it up later when they’re not...staring at one another in awkward quiet. If that’s the reason for Sam’s earth-spiced scent, he’s definitely interested in learning about it.

“Oh,” Steve says, “That’s why you smell like that?”

Sam’s eyebrows rise so high they nearly escape his forehead. “Like what?”

“Like earth and spice,” Steve answers, “Most people just smell like...people: sweat and natural-people-smells, whatever they surround themselves with in their daily lives, but you’ve got that in there too. Pretty strongly, sometimes. It’s a nice change from everyone else.”

Sam stares at him. “Huh.”

They lapse into quiet again, both taking another swallow of tea.

“So, do you...turn into a human fuzzball or an actual wolf?” Sam eventually asks.

Steve huffs a short, quiet laugh. “Both,” he answers. Sam’s eyebrows jump high again. Steve raises his left hand and shifts it, lengthens his fingers like his right, then farther, nails growing long and curved and hair lengthening into something closer to fur from the back of his hand to his wrist. Sam’s eyes go wide. “The further I shift it, the closer it gets to a wolf,” Steve explains, pushing the transformation a little further. His fingers all start to come together into something closer to a paw. He stops, shifting it back into his human hand, turning it around and back for Sam’s benefit.

“That’s…” Sam trails off, doesn’t finish. “What do you look like as a wolf? Or is that too personal to ask.” he adds quickly, shaken out of his shock long enough to look somewhere between apologetic and a little embarrassed.

Steve smiles, tension slowly easing out of his body even while his stomach does a little swoop. Sam’s not running, or screaming, or yelling at him or kicking him out. This is...going better than he’d thought it would.

“It’s fine,” Steve answers, “I’d show you, but I don’t think it’s safe for me to shift right now.” He worries his lower lip briefly. “Because...full disclosure, but I’m...pregnant?” he ends on a question, wincing a little.

Sam does a double-take. “You’re... _what?_ ”

Steve looks away guiltily, looks back and finds Sam’s eyes staring down somewhere through the counter to where Steve’s stomach might be. “I might need something stronger,” he states. Steve bites his lip to keep from smiling. “Wait,” Sam says, shaking himself out of it, “ _How_ are you pregnant?”

Steve shrugs his shoulders helplessly. “Don’t know. I tried doing some research on wolves but…” he trails off, pulling his phone out and tapping the screen on, then opening his browser and his bookmarks. He offers the phone over to Sam, screen open to a page on wolves he’d bookmarked a while back.

Sam slowly takes it and squints down at the text. 

“‘Omega’,” he quotes five minutes later, looking up as he hands the phone back, “That you?”

Steve takes it with a nod, closing out of the browser and shutting the screen off before slipping the whole thing back in his pocket. “Apparently.”

“So who’s your ‘alpha’?” Sam asks, going still as he comes to a realization, “...Oh. Shit. _No way_. _Barnes?_ ”

Steve flinches a little, cheeks going warm. Sam looks heavenwards and shakes his head.

“I should’ve known,” he says.

Steve tries to frown but his cheeks feel hot. “You haven’t even seen us together.”

“No, but you get this look on your face when you talk about him,” Sam says, resigned. He takes another swallow of his tea. “Not to mention the photos from my old high school history lessons.” Sam shakes his head.

Whiskers chooses that moment to hop up onto the counter, walking over to sniff at the edge of Sam’s mug until he he drags it away. Sam’s brows tug together, looking from her to Steve. “Cats are fine around you?”

“Yeah. S.H.I.E.L.D. tested it,” Steve answers. Sam’s brows lift. “They mostly just ignored me. I’m surprised she got over her wariness of me so quickly,” Steve half jokes. 

Sam’s eyebrows hike up a little further before they drop, lips pulling up in a smirk. “How about dogs?”

Now it’s Steve’s turn to look skyward. “They, um...they’re very...attentive?” he settles on, glancing over at Sam while taking a long sip of his tea.

“They follow you everywhere, don’t they,” Sam says, not asks, smirk widening. Steve sighs. “I need to take you to a pet store.”

“Oh, God. _No_.”

\--

They finish their teas and then move to the living room. Sam manages to sit still for all of two minutes, staring at Steve’s shield resting against the coffee table for half of it, before jumping back up to his feet and heading straight back into the kitchen. Steve watches him over the back of the couch, sees him pull down ingredients and his mixer and three baking pans all in quick succession. 

Since Sam turned Netflix on beforehand, Steve finds something to play low in the background while Sam...works through things (and pulls his phone out to start researching what a ‘witch’ is).

\--

Sam bakes one cake, two dozen cookies, two different kinds of macaroons, and three cheesecakes. Steve buys him three different sets of candles, more lavender, enough pumpkin spice to fuel the local coffee shop for three Autumns, and a Jack O’ Lantern shaped baking pan. He checks out his cartful on his phone right as the oven timer _dings_ on the last batch of macaroons (on the plus side, Steve’s pretty sure Sam is going to send him home with a lot of food).

\--

( _He does_ ).

\--

Steve checks his whole house and truck when he gets back - after checking his mailbox - after Sam drops him off (“I’m not making you _walk_ back to your house without shoes, werewolf or no. Not to mention that shield is an attention grabber and that’s the last thing you want, right?” “...You should check your mailbox too”). There are no bugs or listening devices that Steve can find, which makes it easier for him to relax. He’s still wary, but it’s been a long day, so he lets it, and his shield, rest for now.

He heads into the bathroom connected to his bedroom, resting the shield against the sink cabinets before stripping out of his clothes and hopping in the shower. He doesn’t notice it then, not when he’s scrubbing his fingers in his hair or when he gets out and cleans the floors, not when he gets in bed afterwards with his shield resting against the side of it within arm’s reach, or when he curls up and slowly flips through his saved pictures of Bucky until he falls asleep.

He notices it the next morning, after he’s done with his morning routine of throwing up and rubbing a hand over his sore stomach:

He can feel a curving bump there.


	26. What's next?

Steve heads over to Sam’s the next day (in his truck this time, wearing shoes. And checks Sam’s mailbox, just in case - finds nothing). He takes his shield (back in its bag) and lets Sam stare at him off and on while Sam bakes. Steve takes his gloves off after a minute of hesitating, sets them on the counter and tries to withstand Sam’s glancing gazes, then tries to break the silence:

“I can feel a bump now,” he blurts.

Or maybe just make more of it.

Sam stops in the middle of taking a tray of cookies out of the oven, staring. “...Are you kidding me?” he asks, eyes gradually widening, “ _Are you kidding me?_ ” 

Steve blinks, watching him apprehensively.

“ _Can I feel it?_ ” Sam blurts this time. _Steve_ stares, and then starts laughing, low and quiet growing into loud and- _giddy_.

“ _Yes_ ,” he manages to get out, sliding off the chair while Sam all but drops the cookie tray on the counter and jogs around the length of it. Steve lifts his shirt and instinctively tenses when Sam reaches forward. Sam slows his hand, and then Steve feels fingers press to his stomach, one slow fingertip at a time. The muscles jump before settling and Sam’s eyes bulge.

“I can’t believe what I’m feeling,” he breathes.

Steve can’t help grinning. “Me neither.”

Sam slowly retracts his hand and Steve puts his oversized sweatshirt back down, relaxing into it again.

“Are you...Do you know how you’re going to have it?” Sam asks, eyes leaping up to his. Steve pauses then shakes his head a little. Sam blows out a breath.

“Yeah,” Steve agrees.

“Might need to go to the hospi-”

“No hospitals,” Steve cuts him off firmly, and Sam blinks. Steve shakes his head. “It’s not safe,” he adds, looking down while settling his hand over his stomach, “For either of us. Either it’s coming out naturally, or I’ll cut my stomach open myself.”

Sam makes a face at that. “Steve-”

Steve shakes his head again, can tell his eyes are glowing when he looks up from his stomach and Sam’s widen. “I _can’t_ , Sam,” he says, quiet and sure.

Sam takes a slow breath. “Alright,” he says after a minute, “Alright.”

\-----

His nausea steadily gets worse over the first two weeks, so Steve eats as much as he can manage in the evenings to make up for the loss of calorie intake. It seems to help, and Sam takes notice and feeds him more, which _also_ seems to help (Steve’s noticed he’s always going home with food these days, usually a bagfull).

And some time between it all, it _snows_ , big, white flakes drifting down from faintly glowing clouds blanketing the sky. Steve spends three hours just staring out his window, watching it fall and build and build until the rocks and grass of his driveway and yard disappear beneath the white, hot mug of tea steaming slow between his hands. 

He thinks of Bucky, of them running through the forest as teenagers, and he thinks of his mother, and wonders if she’d be proud of him like this, if she’d be happy for him. He’s more sure of the latter than the former, but...maybe she’d make an acception for him, just once, for not wanting to go back to the uniform and shield. Maybe she’d agree that he’s done enough, more than enough, and rather than be proud that he’d stayed with it, be proud that he could put it down and let it go.

\-----

The month flows steadily along like the rest, at least until Steve learns about Christmas and its gift giving tradition. The human in him wants to get Sam something really nice, the wolf in him wants to get Sam something really nice and _dead_. He seemed to like the candles and lavender, baking pan and pumpkin spice. Maybe Steve should stick with things along those lines? Better than a large deer carcass, at any rate.

Either way, he’s in a bit of a conundrum. What do you get the guy whose world you just abruptly flipped upside down _and_ bent out of shape all at once? The guy who’s been there for you almost since day one. 

Steve ruminates on it for a week, finally settling on something a week before the day. Just enough time for shipping.

\-----

Steve puts on one of his baggy sweaters in the morning and a coat, and then him and Sam head into town. The decorations have almost immediately gone from _pumpkins, ghosts, cats_ and _cauldrons_ to _colorful lights, cookies, candy canes_ , and _Christmas trees_ , the last of which Sam is determined to help him pick out. Steve understands the idea in theory, but it’s still...strange.

“I can’t believe I agreed to putting a _tree_ in my house,” he speculates while they rove down the aisle of them, a small forest with a sign waving a little above their heads proclaiming ‘ _Christmas Tree Sale!_ ’

Sam just lets out a preoccupied, enthusiastic, “ _Yes_ ,” and drags him over to another hulking one, taller than Steve is and double what he is wide. “What do you think?” Sam asks. 

Steve studies it. “It’s big,” he decides, resisting the urge to rub his stomach, “I’m not sure…”

Sam looks back at him. “We don’t have to get one if you really don’t want to. I just thought...well, you’ve technically never celebrated Christmas, and you don’t have to be religious to appreciate a lot of what comes with it.”

“I-...” Steve trails off, glancing down, around. He’s still uncertain, but...he wants to do this for his child, even though it’s not born yet. He could probably use the practice.

He looks back up.

“No, I want to. It looks good?” he asks, looking back to Sam for guidance. As far as trees go, it looks healthy, and going by the smell, recently cut. There’s pine _everywhere_. Steve can barely smell himself in it all.

“Yup. This is the best one I’ve seen in the last three rows. Even outside that, it’s really good,” Sam replies, looking from it back to him. He gives Steve a few moments to look it over. “Wanna get this one?” he asks, watching him, waiting patiently, 

Steve nods.

Sam flags down one of the sellers roaming around and Steve helps Sam get the tree into the back of his truck, trying to be subtle about his strength. It’s difficult, but he manages.

“Now what?” Steve asks after settling into the driver’s seat and starting the truck.

“ _Now_ we get decorations,” Sam answers, grinning. 

For a smaller town, they sure do have a big selection of those, it turns out. They stop for coffee at Shark’s first and Sam spends a few minutes talking to Lindy while she makes their drinks, and Steve watches them with a small smile.

\--

Steve taps at his laptop while Sam bakes gingerbread cookies. Apparently they’re going to make a house with them and the assortment of candy in the bags Sam set out on the counter. He said he’s even baking Steve a little circle for his ‘shield’. Steve browses a few sites about Christmas, bringing up a saved picture of Bucky every so often when he feels a twang of longing in his chest, chords strung tight.

“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Sam says after a bit into the comfortable quiet, the now familiar sounds of the mixer going, bottles set on the granite counter, the oven doors opening and closing. Apparently two, one stacked on the other opposite the fridge, is a ‘gift that Sam is not wasting’. “Do you know about New Years?”

Steve looks over and shakes his head when Sam looks back. More cutout shapes of auburn cookie dough go on the tray.

“It’s a celebration for the start of the new year,” Sam explains, laying out a person-shaped piece. Steve eyes it warily. That’s kind of morbid. “You don’t have to do anything for it, but a lot of people will have get-togethers, throw parties, drink champagne and kiss at the end of the countdown.” Sam’s eyebrows raise while he lays down a final piece, barely fitting on the tray. “There is an _obscene_ amount of kissing.”

Steve thinks for a moment. “Plan on kissing Lindy?” he teases with a small smirk. Sam raises an eyebrow at him after getting the tray in the oven, shutting the door.

“I don’t kiss and tell, Rogers.” 

Steve smiles. “But…?”

“But,” Sam continues, pulling off his snowflake covered oven mitts, “I was gonna go into town for a little bit, maybe see if they do anything for New Years or not. My family’s not coming up for it or Christmas, so I wanted to ask if you wanted to hang out for both?”

Steve smiles again, nodding. “I’d like that. I didn’t think about this place being so quiet when I bought it. It’s nice to have company.”

“So that’s how it is?” Sam jokes.

Steve huffs. “ _And_ I enjoy _your_ company.”

Sam grins a bit. “I’m looking forward to it. I haven’t shared a Christmas or New Years with anyone outside of my family since...Riley.”

Steve blinks, sitting up a little. “Riley?”

Sam smiles, but it’s old and subdued. “My wingman. I lost him before coming back from my tour. Kind of in a similar fashion to...well, you and Barnes. He’s the reason I got out.”

Steve frowns a little, eyes dropping to the counter for a moment before he forces them back up. “Were you…?”

“Nah,” Sam answers, shaking his head a bit. He comes over and takes a seat opposite Steve on the other side of the counter. “We never got to that point. I trusted him with my life, but I never got to tell him...it had become more, that I wanted to trust him with my heart. I kind of think he knew, though.”

“I’m sorry, Sam,” Steve says quietly after a moment, earnest. 

Sam nods a little, eyes dropping to the granite.

They ruminate in silence, surrounded by the warm smells of cinnamon and ginger, and Steve pulls up another picture of Bucky. He tries not to feel too bad for feeling lucky and grateful. Even with everything that happened, they’re both _here_. That’s more than many others can say.

\-----

Decorating the tree is a slow...intricate process. Sam makes a pained face every time Steve puts something up in the ‘wrong order’, looks like he regrets telling Steve to do it in any order he wants. Steve puts the lights on last just to see his face (and maybe as recompense for yesterday in Sam’s kitchen). After a little while, the last of the tension in Sam’s body and scent finally fades back to nothing.

Christmas approaches quickly after that. Steve spends his days at Sam’s, watching movies, listening to the Christmas music Sam puts on loop while he bakes a huge selection of food and sweets. After some web browsing, Steve finds out some of the singers are from when he was born, or after. He tries to remember them, gives it a go after months of letting things lie, but nothing comes. It doesn’t take away his enjoyment of the music, at least.

Steve wakes Christmas morning with a chirped text, phone light blinking bright white. He rolls and reaches over, a pulse of hope spreading throughout his chest like a drop of bright blue food color curling out into water before he’s awake enough to remember Bucky wouldn’t have his number. Still, it _could_ be him. It’s a thin thread of hope, but Steve keeps a grip on it even after he turns his phone on and gets his messages open to see who the text is really from, and finds out it’s not Bucky.

_merry xmas. Hope u get a shiny red bike. P.s. Pepper says Merry Christmas 2_

Steve blinks slowly, then smiles, even with the ache in his chest, tapping at his keypad.

_Thank you Tony. Merry Christmas, to Pepper too_

He lays in bed for another fifteen minutes before finally rolling up out of it, letting out a slow breath as his stomach roils. It doesn’t send him running to the bathroom, though, which is a nice change.

To his surprise, when he walks out into his living room, he catches a flash of bright red out one of the windows and heads over, peering out and staring. There’s a bright red and black motorcycle in his driveway with gold accents, smooth and streamline and newer looking than his own, with a huge red bow wrapped around it.

Steve heads back down to his room to change into clothes for the day, puts on one of his soft, baggy sweaters and jeans, socks, a coat, and shoes. He grabs his shield bag and his keys and steps out, locks his front door behind him, and heads over to the motorcycle. He gives it a long look before he bends down and lifts it, carrying it over and putting it in the back of his truck. He climbs in and starts the engine, heading over to Sam’s.

\--

Sam whips the door open before he even gets to Sam’s driveway and gestures wildly at the new truck Steve pulls in to park next to. Steve grins and kills the engine, slipping out. 

“I hope it’s okay,” he calls.

“Okay?” Sam repeats, “ _I can’t believe you_.” He stops a foot away and stares at it, eyes roaming over the black and silver and red. “ _Of course_ it’s okay. You bought me a _truck, I can’t believe you bought me a truck_.”

Steve smiles wider, chuckling low in his chest. “About that.”

Sam’s head swivels around. Steve moves to the back of his truck and Sam’s eyes widen. “No. No way. _Another one?_ ”

Steve pulls the motorcycle out and sets it down, toeing the kickstand out and gently tilting the whole thing to rest on the fine gravel. “It’s from Tony,” Steve explains, looking up, “I’m re-gifting it. I already have a bike, and I think the colors suit you a lot better.” 

Sam stares at him. Steve tries not to fidget as he glances around.

“And, y’know...maybe we could go riding together some time.”

When he looks back, Sam’s still staring, but at the bike this time. He comes forward slowly like he’s approaching a wild beast, and just as slowly runs his palm down over the length of it, front to back. “Are you sure?” he asks, looking up, “Steve, this bike is beautiful. And it looks damn expensive. And it’s from _Tony Stark_ ,” he finishes, like that’s the most important thing.

Steve huffs a laugh. “Yeah, I’m sure. And I’d like the company when I can ride again.”

Sam looks at him for a moment more before grinning, huge and wide, then rounding the bike and throwing his arms around him, careful to be obvious about it, Steve notes. Steve wraps his arms around Sam in return, trying not to burrow too much into the contact. He hasn’t really touched anyone in a while, or been touched. It feels good.

“You’ve done so much for me, Sam,” Steve says as Sam pulls away, “This is the _least_ I could give you.”

Sam smiles big again, sharing the moment with him in peaceful morning quiet, then says, “Come on, let’s get out of this snow and inside. I’ve got some pumpkin spice drinks hot and ready and _homemade_ , lattes _and_ tea.”

Steve’s stomach gives a low growl and he follows Sam in, smiling, feeling warmed already.

\--

Sam leads him out to the barn after they’re finished with their drinks, and Steve sees the tarp again, bright blue in the dim, winter light hitting it’s rough textured edges and making it even brighter. Sam walks over and grabs hold of it, looking back.

“You ready?”

Steve nods and Sam _pulls_ , and Steve’s eyes widen while his breath gets sucked away.

It’s beautiful, front and back, top end and foot end. The posts are tree roots spiraling and twisting up, curved and wrapped around one another with a wolf curving up the outer edge, melded into the woodwork like intertwined lovers, unable to escape without breaking them both. There’s one wolf per post, and Steve pauses when he sees-

He walks forward and leans in close, reaching out- Pauses, looking over to Sam for permission. Sam nods and Steve looks back to the right end post, brushing his fingers over the smooth, polished wood of the bird.

“Sorry if it was a bit presumptuous,” Sam says, pulling Steve out of his thoughts. He looks over. Sam looks almost...sheepish. “The bird is me,” Sam admits, “I can remove it if you want me to, I just thought…”

Steve stands up and walks over, tugging Sam into a hug. “You were right,” he says into Sam’s shoulder, Sam’s arms wrapping around his waist and hugging back. He relaxes a little in Steve’s grip, the nervousness in his scent fading.

“Yeah?” Sam asks.

Steve nods, pulling back with a smile. “Yes. You belong there, if you want to be.”

Sam nods, warm smile easing its way onto his face. He gently claps Steve’s shoulder and Steve’s smile widens. He looks back to the bed.

“It’s beautiful Sam. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Thank _you_.”

They share another a smile and then put the tarp back over it. Steve takes it home and sets it up at both ends of his bed, giving it a long look before pulling his phone out and taking a picture. He wants to...show someone, so he sends a copy of the picture to Tony.

_wow, nice craftsmanship. Pepper is doubly impressed_

Steve smiles, then pauses.

_Can I have her phone number?_

_why? Gonna make a move on my girl? Not cool Cap_

Followed by a string of numbers.

Steve smiles and sends her a simple message of:

_Hello, Ms. Potts. I hope this is okay. I’ve just heard so much about you._

His phone pings a few moments later.

_Likewise, Captain Rogers. (: It’s perfectly fine. The bed frame is beautiful. I’d hoped the furniture was alright._

_Yes, more than. Thank you so much._

She pings him back and Steve sends another reply before making his way back out the door and back to Sam’s, feeling warm. 

Not bad for his first Christmas, he thinks.

\--

Steve sits in the middle of his bed that evening, just staring at the smooth, carved designs, runs his hands over the polished, sealed wood, and lets his fingers trace the winding tree roots, jagged wolf fur, feathers and leaves and breathes in the rich scent of the wood still clinging to the sealant. He lays back after a while, after it’s gone dark, and turns his head, glimpsing the edges of the wolves carved into the sides of the top two posts, curved out into the dark. 

_Me_ , he thinks, looking from the right to the left, _Bucky_. And all the distance between them.

He curls up in the safety of the confines now bracketing him in from the top and bottom of the bed, and it’s not Bucky, exactly, but it does make him feel better.

\-----

Steve curls up on Sam’s couch New Year’s evening, rubbing a hand over the slowly growing bump that is becoming his stomach and closing his eyes to scent the air after he hears the pop of Sam opening a bottle of cider. It smells sharp, crisp, like the snow outside, but bittersweet. He opens his eyes and accept the glass Sam hands him as he comes around, sniffing at it before bringing it to his lips-

“Hey!”

Steve jerks his head back, eyes snapping up.

“Not until the end of the count,” Sam scolds. 

Steve looks over to the muted tv, lowering his glass, watching the countdown in flashing bright lights.

 _“10!”_ the subtitles lights scream.

_“9!”_

_“8!”_

_“7!”_

_“6!”_

_“5!”_

_“4!” “3!” “2!” “1!”_

Shiny paper explodes everywhere on the screen and Sam reaches over. Steve looks back, gently tapping their glasses together with a small smile before taking a sip. It prickles and pops across his tongue, it’s own tiny series of explosions down his throat. He squeezes his eyes shut and scrunches his face as it goes down, hears Sam laugh quietly.

“Another year,” Sam says, eyes lighting when Steve’s open and find his again, “Your _first_ ,” Sam adds with delight.

Steve smiles. _Bucky too_ , he thinks, _Both of us_. 

He looks out the window into the night and takes another sip, hand rubbing slow and gentle over his belly.

\-----

Bucky stumbles, foot catching in a groove and shoulder hitting the side of the building. He holds in a grunt and keeps his grips on the guns, forces himself to keep going, dragging his shoulder off the wall and staggering his way out into the snow, breaths fogging in the night air. 

He makes sure he’s made it into the forest, far enough that the sounds of the sirens and screaming in the town are faded, muted. When his foot snags again on a branch, he falls, knees hitting hard enough to jar his teeth and shake his frame, then the rest of him hits the snow and dirt and he lays there, face half in the snow, melting to water against his skin wherever his breaths puff. His fingers twitch on the guns and he pants, trying to drag in air past the pain in his side, his chest, his body, can still smell the singe all over his clothes. He can feel the warmth leaving him, the blood a slow but steady stream. He needs to get up or he’s gonna bleed out here in the middle of- shit, where is he? Romania?

He pushes himself, rolls onto his back while holding in a groan at the _ache_ spreading all over and stares up, panting, fog-breaths mixing with and obscuring the bare branches overhead, the stars in the gaps.

 _Steve_ , he thinks, soft and quiet, quieter than the owl hooting ten feet away and the crunching-

 _Shit_. 

Someone’s getting closer and he forces his head and one of the guns up, ignores the waver in his vision, his arm. The steps come to a stop fifteen feet away, along with a black shadow next to a tree.

“Sir,” a woman’s voice says, “I’ve got him.”

He grits his teeth.

She doesn’t come forward, and he tries to squeeze the trigger, but his vision is rapidly going just as black as the sky above their heads.


	27. No I won't be afraid, oh I won't be afraid

Sam finally brings up something Steve’s been working towards asking. He’s been trying to figure out _how_ to ask.

“You’re going to eat me out of house and home at this rate,” Sam jokes.

Steve smiles around the edge of his mug. “Want me to become your patron?”

“Considering how much of my food you eat?” Sam raises a brow.

Steve huffs a laugh. “You were baking a storm long before I started partaking.”

Sam concedes that with an agreeing hum. Steve takes another sip of his tea, taking a moment to try and figure out how to word what he wants to ask and not fidget in his chair, tap his foot against the footrest and let his nerves show.

“Speaking of food,” he starts. Sam hums distractedly, a question, rinsing the suds off his baking tray. “I need to ask you a favor?”

Sam looks over, raising an inquisitive brow while shutting off the water.

“Can you...I wanted to ask if you could help me grocery shop?” Steve asks hesitantly, “I won’t be able to go into town soon.” At least according to the pregnancy sites he’s been looking at. He’s not a human or a biological female, so he’s not sure how accurate they’re going to turn out to be.

Sam stares at him a moment before it hits him. “Oh! Yeah, I can do that. No problem.”

“I’ll pay for them,” Steve adds quickly, relaxing a little, “And gas. I just...won’t be able to be around people.”

“Yeah. It’s fine,” Sam returns, “I get it. I’ll help.”

Steve deflates a bit. He wasn’t sure if Sam would or not. “Thanks Sam.”

“No problem,” Sam smiles. He goes back to tending his baking trays and Steve takes another drink. After a minute, Sam says, “You wouldn’t happen to have been planning that all along? That I _would_ help, would you?”

Steve’s eyes widen and he ducks his head a little. “Not that extensively,” he admits, “Moving next to you and you being my neighbour wasn’t planned. I had _hoped_ I could tell you what I was after I got to know you, but I didn’t just so you would help me with...this. If my neighbour was someone else, someone I didn’t get along with, I would have gone it alone.”

Sam studies him. “So...a little bit.”

“A little bit,” Steve agrees, “It just kind of seemed like it might work out. But you _are_ my friend, Sam. I didn’t get to know you just so I could use you.” Well, a tiny part of him wanted to, the instincts part. After a point, he realized he was going to need help, especially when it became more apparent that he was pregnant. But the other ninety-nine percent of him just wanted to be Sam’s friend.

His fingers tighten a bit around his mug, watching Sam closely, nervously. He doesn’t want to lose that only friend, especially out here. He knows Tony would drop everything in an instant and come out and help, but Steve doesn’t want Tony out here yet, he wants Sam. Sam who is comforting, and calm, and smiles easily and bakes all day, Sam who smells like earth-spice and whatever treat he’s baked that day. Tony is warm, but Sam is warmer, and Steve is calmer around him, more comfortable, can be easy in a way that goes deeper down.

Sam just watches him for a moment and accept that with a nod, and Steve deflates again.

“I won’t ask you to help with the delivery.”

“Oh man.”

\-----

He’s out, and then he isn’t. There’s quiet _clank-clinks_ to his left and he keeps his breathing slow, his body still, and listens.

A heartbeat, calm and steady, breath from one person. They smell like dulled herbs and machinery, medical equipment and...young, ‘ripe’, not new, not old. He’s laying on something soft, cushioned, and big. A bed? The room smells...neutral, not medical, not lived in. His clothes don’t smell like him or the fire from the explosion he’d set off. Steps move closer-

He jerks up and snaps his left hand out, gripping a throat, his eyes take everything in in a quick sweep after.

White room, metal accents, single sliding door with mostly likely a bulletproof glass window, a young woman choking in a white labcoat, hands gripping at his and his wrist. He loosens his grip just enough that she can suck in air. She does immediately.

“Where am I?” he demands flatly. She smells both of bravery and fear. He can feel her heartbeat trembling in her throat against his hand.

“ _Sh- S.H.I.E.L.D._ ,” she gets out.

The door slides open in his periphery with a soft _whoosh_ of air.

“Sergeant Barnes,” a mild voiced man says, that’s the only way to put it. He is mild, from head to toe, balding, forties, favors his left. The door slides closed. “I would appreciate it if you released my agent.” Who is wisely unmoving, still, under his grip.

Bucky keeps eyes on him and said agent still gasping quietly, breaths shuddering in and out. Otherwise, she hasn’t moved a muscle.

“ _Where am I_ ,” he demands again, flat and low. 

“”S.H.I.E.L.D.,” the man answers pleasantly, crossing his hands in front of himself, “The secret one. We heard about Hydra, so...Fury asked us to start looking into things.” He stops, waits, doesn’t look like he’s going to say any more, so Bucky takes the calculated risk and releases the agent. She sucks in a huge breath and coughs, but strangely, doesn’t make a break for the door.

“We patched up your wounds,” she says with a wince, voice rough from the hold and with an English accent. She rubs at her throat. “They appear to be healing at an accelerated rate and you’ll be fully recovered in approximately three days. We didn’t poke at your arm, no matter _how_ much Fitz wanted to get a look at it,” she rambles quickly with a laugh, clearing her throat and removing her smile when he just side-glances at her. “We removed your clothes to have them washed, you’ll find them on the shelf over there.” She gestures to the white shelves next to the bed on his left. He doesn’t look. “Um...what else...Ah,” she continues. He can almost see the lightbulb going off above her head. “Are you hungry? You’ll probably be _starving_ soon, what with your metabolism and all. I’ll bring something down.”

And with _that_ , she scurries out of the room, hair bobbing gently about her shoulders. The door slides shut again. That just leaves Mild Agent. 

Bucky stares at him and Mild Agent stares back.

“Phil Coulson,” Mild Agent introduces himself as, “Director of the secret S.H.I.E.L.D. I worked with Captain Rogers and the Avengers during the Invasion.” 

Bucky keeps himself from frowning, expression blank. He’s read about the Invasion, or ‘The Incident’, as a lot of people are calling it. The video footage had made him...nervous, in a past tense sort of way, since Steve hadn’t fought the battle _recently_. They hadn’t known each other again then.

“Right. Straight to business then,” Coulson says, “We’ve been following your activity for four months, a little after you started. We’ve been actively tracking you for three. We didn’t know it was you until a couple weeks ago. You don’t like leaving people alive long enough to talk, and any footage we’ve tried salvaging has either been too damaged to salvage anything from, or you’ve avoided showing anything recognizable on the surveillance. Smart.”

Bucky holds back another frown, listening. The man is still blocking the door, and stranger still, Bucky can still use his left arm. It hasn’t been immobilized. He could try to leave, risk it, but he doesn’t know what’s beyond the door, what kind of facility he’s in. It’s too risky, at the moment.

“Eventually, we caught a break,” Coulson continues, “One of our agents was able to recover a small amount of footage from the wrecked remains of a Hydra base you took down a few bases ago. Your combat style is brutally effective, and impressive.”

Bucky keeps himself still. That way only leads to more trouble, people wanting, him and his skills.

“You’ve been making waves all over Europe,” Coulson says, “We thought it might be best if you acted quieter, and felt it was only a matter of time before you required backup.”

Bucky narrows his eyes fractionally. “You want to monitor me and work together.”

“Something like that.” Coulson smiles again. “I understand if you’re reluctant, your cursory physical examination showcased a variety of reasons for you to be, but if you help us, we’ll help you.”

Barnes inclines and tilts his head slightly. “How.”

“Well, for one, you’ll have help and reinforcements, as well as access to state of the art medical facilities and more weapons and ammunition than I think even you would know what to do with,” Coulson lists, as still and unmoving as stone. It’s smart. “And two, afterwards, I can get you home.”

Bucky tenses slightly.

“Yes, I know where he is,” Coulson states, “But it’s beyond classified. Only four people know his location. That’s including me.”

That could be a lie. This whole thing could be a lie, but Bucky can’t smell it when he breathes in the man’s scent from across the room.

“I’m also aware of what you are, but that’s just as classified,” Coulson adds. 

Bucky slowly slides up off the bed. “Seems you know everything,” he says lowly.

“It’s my job,” Coulson replies agreeably, still smiling that neutrally pleasant smile of his.

It’s quiet.

“So. What do you think?” Coulson asks, “You’re a bit hard to read.”

Bucky takes a breath, slowly lets it out. “Is the choice real?”

Coulson’s expression flickers, brief and minute, looks almost sad for a fraction of a second. “Yes. You can continue doing what you’ve been doing, and so will we. You’re free to leave. But getting rid of Hydra will take longer.”

Bucky holds in a frown at that, because Coulson has a point. It’s been too long already. On the other hand, this could all be a trap to capture the Winter Soldier and he’ll never see Steve again. He’s not oblivious to how valuable he is to S.H.I.E.L.D. and other agencies, organizations. He’s a warhead they can fire like a gun and decimate their competition.

“Would you like some time to think about it?” Coulson asks, pulling him out of his thoughts.

“No,” Bucky answers, “But I have conditions.”

Coulson nods, waiting.

“I do what I want, when I want, how I want. I don’t follow your rules, you and your agents don’t get in my way,” Bucky lists, “No tracking or monitoring devices on me, no cuffs, no disabling my arm. I am a free agent.”

Coulson nods after a moment.

“All Hydra data, files, and information are destroyed,” Bucky finishes. Coulson straightens, just slightly. “I don’t care if S.H.I.E.L.D. wants to rummage through the trash, everything burns,” he growls, eyes flashing and teeth extending. He shortens them back while Coulson’s eyes unwiden the fraction they retracted. 

Coulson studies him. “I have reasons, but I realize I can’t offer them to you.”

Bucky sneers. “That’s my price.”

Quiet.

He almost scoffs. “You’re all the same,” he says, turning to walk around the end of the bed and grab his clothes, keeping Coulson in his periphery. “Can’t let go of the world’s dirty secrets, even when the cost is this.” He pulls his shirt up and off and sees Coulson shift a little. “This is hell,” Bucky states, raising his left hand a little and looking at it, then over to Coulson, “And all of you would gladly jump into it head first with your ‘good intentions’. I don’t care if you want to damn yourselves, but do it with another cesspit. Hydra burns.”

Coulson’s expression tightens, looking minutely...uncomfortable. All of his microexpressions and that one might be the strongest so far. It’s not a bad sign, but it’s not exactly good. It’s not a guarantee he won’t fuck Bucky over ten ways to Sunday.

He inspects his shirt for any modifications or devices, finds none. He pulls it on over his head.

“Fine,” Coulson agrees, “I’ll meet all of your conditions.”

“I have one more,” Bucky adds, inspecting his pants before pushing down the ones they put on him and pulling his own back on. He grabs his gun off the table and ejects the clip, checks that it’s still got ammo in it and slides it back in, pulling the hammer back and catching the ejected bullet. He checks to make sure it’s not a dummy before ejecting the clip again to push it back in. He looks up. “You leave Steve alone. Whatever he decides he wants to do, you let him do it. I don’t care if the world’s coming to an end. If he wants to stay home and watch some cooking show, you let him. You don’t drag him back in. He’s given enough,” he states firmly.

Coulson watches him for a few moments before nodding, lips curving up faintly. “I couldn’t agree more. You have my word.”

“I don’t want your word,” Bucky replies, “I want your promise.” There’s no point in getting it in writing. Papers can be burned, data can be lost, but the promise from one soul to another is a bit more permanent.

Coulson nods again. “I promise.”

Bucky nods slowly, then tucks the gun in the back of his pants, flipping the bottom of his shirt down over it. “Fine. I’ll work with you.”

“Excellent.” Coulson smiles, turning a bit towards the door. “Also,” he adds while Bucky’s putting his boots back on. He looks over. “It’s an honor to meet you,” Coulson says, smile more real, “Big fan. I asked Captain Rogers to sign my trading cards.”

Bucky blinks.

“ _Okay, I can’t anymore_ ,” a voice says from all over. Bucky’s head whips around. A dark haired woman’s face appears on the large screen to the left. “ _For the record, I don’t think you need backup. You’re a **tank.** Except for that last one where I found you bleeding out in the snow_.”

Bucky stares.

“Sergeant Barnes,” Coulson says, “Meet Skye, your new teammate.”

The girl waves and Bucky slowly raises a hand and waves back.

“ _Pleasure to meet you while you’re, y’know, awake_ ,” she says, “ _Not nearly as much pleasure as Coulson’s probably feeling right about now_.”

“ _Skye_.”

Bucky’s eyes dart between the two. What in the hell has he gotten himself into.

\-----

It takes a little while, but Steve was expecting it to happen sooner or later, especially after Fury. 

He gets more visitors, starting with the second one.

\-----

_4 Months Later_

 

He wanders out, night after the full moon, digs his toes in the dewy grass and breathes out a sigh. It feels good on his sore feet, makes the ache a little less. The cool air feels good in his lungs, too, the star and moonlight a comfort, smooth as a silk blanket where it lights on his skin and makes it prickle just the gentlest bit. He wraps his arms around himself above the mound his stomach has quickly grown to, looking up at the stars.

A cool breeze blows by ten minutes later and Steve catches a wild, unfamiliar scent on the wind, like mint and ivy wrapped in one, eyes darting around. He spots the source just beyond the border of his trees, tensing.

There’s a wolf there, like him, a big one. It looks brown in the night shade, darker patterns framing its face and belly, gold eyes like suns in the dark. They stare at one another, and after a tense, five minute stand off, it starts taking a slow step forward- 

Steve growls, loud and low, a warning. He can’t tell if it’s male or female, or mated, but it smells alpha and...available, maybe. He’s not really sure what that smells like, but it smells...open.

It freezes, paw lifted, ears flick and flickering. After another minute of staring, tension thick in the air, it turns and takes off into the trees. Steve slowly unwinds the harder it gets hard to hear its paws and heartbeat speeding away, his own heart gradually mellowing out as he blows out a breath.

He knows he’s an omega and he knows he’s unmated, but he’s also pregnant. His scent’s changed. Would any wolf want him like this? Would any _one?_ Even Bucky might not…

He shakes his head, chases the thought away, and heads back for the house. He’ll start being more careful. It’s a small comfort, at least, to know he and Bucky really aren’t alone, even if it’s simultaneously one of the most stressful things he’s had to think about since waking from the ice. It’s a double edged sword, one he doesn’t want to fall on.

\--

He jolts awake the next morning, eyes darting around. What woke-

Something _thumps_ against him and he surges up to sitting, staring down at his stomach. 

It kicked.

\--

“It kicked,” he announces that evening at Sam’s. Sam nearly drops his baking pan and hits the back of his head when he jerks up out of where he’s half buried in a lower cabinet. Steve winces in sympathy.

“ _What_ ,” Sam lets out, turning to him with eyes wide. Steve just grins and Sam practically runs around the end of the counter, dropping his baking pan on it on the way over. “ _Can I?_ ” Steve pulls up his sweater and Sam’s hands slowly ease onto his stomach, all that excitement kept in restraint. They both wait, and wait, and wait- 

Steve feels that _thump_ again and Sam’s eyes widen, a grin slowly overtaking his face.

“Man, that’s _amazing_ ,” he breathes, slowly pulling his hands away. Steve puts down his sweater. “A little strange, but...wow,” he lets out, stunned.

Steve smiles, looking down at his stomach and rubbing a hand over it over his sweater, wool bunching up gently.

“Strong kick,” Sam comments, that little worried note back in his voice that’s been gradually showing up more and more often these past few months.

Steve blows out a slow breath. “Yeah,” he replies, “She’s definitely a fighter.”

“‘She’?” Sam looks up.

Steve stills, blinking. “Um. He? I don’t know, but…” He looks back down, smoothing his hand over his stomach in a slow circle. “I don’t know,” he repeats, “Just a feeling. I could be wrong.”

“Fifty-fifty.” Sam shrugs, smiling curving back up on his face. “I made some more of that lavender mix for your baths.”

Steve deflates, didn’t realize he’d had any tension left. “Thanks,” he replies sincerely, “I’m almost out.”

“Yup,” Sam pops the ‘p’, turning back around and grabbing up his baking pan again, “Now, what shape we feelin’ tonight?”

Steve hums thoughtfully. “A flower?”

“I can do that.”

\-----

His second visitor shows up a month later, with a...fruit basket?

Steve stares through the front door window warily, tense, slowly reaching forward and turning the door handle and cautiously pulling the door open, shield in front of himself. Romanoff’s eyebrows just barely rise above the top edge of her sunglasses, eyes hidden from his.

“Have you ever heard of _Twilight?_ ” she asks, “It’s pandemic, but maybe you should give the third movie a watch.”

They stare at one another.

“What are you doing here?” Steve asks.

“Just thought I’d stop by,” she answers, “See how you were doing.”

“For Fury?” Steve narrows his eyes a little.

Her lips quirk briefly. “No. For me.”

They stare at one another again. She reaches up and he tenses fractionally, but she just pushes her sunglasses up onto her hair, bare eyes meeting his.

“I didn’t know,” she says, and Steve studies her. She looks and sounds sincere, but she’s...a mirror, a placid mirror, and with her scent, she’s perfectly, wholly unreadable. But his gut is saying she means it, and he’s learned to trust that.

He nods a little and she nods back.

“I brought you some things,” she says after a minute, eyes dropping to the basket. He looks down after she does, watching her lean over to set it next to the door. “You can check it for bugs and listening devices, trackers. I don’t know what in it will be helpful and what won’t, but there might be something in there you could use.” She looks back up.

“...Thank you,” Steve says, quiet and honest. Her lips do that quirk again, but a softer one. After another few moments, he sighs. “Does everyone know?”

“No,” she answers, “I found out about the miscarriage from Fury, and I don’t think the hunters know about it.” Steve cringes. “But no one but Fury, your neighbour, and I know about that one.” She nods towards his stomach and he tenses instinctively. Natasha doesn’t bat an eye. “Your secret is still a secret,” she adds.

“That’s not very reassuring,” he returns.

Her lips curve up. “Secrets known by more than you rarely are.” She turns a little and looks out around his property, eyes doing a slow sweep. She probably did one already, but it looks like she’s taking things in from a different...he’s not sure what. He doesn’t quite know how she works. He thinks maybe that’s the point. “It’s nice out here. It suits you,” she says, turning back to look up at him.

He frowns a little, glancing out briefly before returning his eyes to her. He’s uncomfortable leaving her...unattended, even though she’s standing right in front of him. The proximity might actually be making it worse.

“What happened with the hunters?” he asks, because he needs to know.

“They’re gone,” she answers, “As far as I know. Barton and I are keeping an ear to the ground.”

He nods, letting that settle. He tries to hold his tongue on the next question quickly sprouting wings in his chest, but it flies right out of his mouth anyway, “Any sign of him?” 

“No,” she answers, “Not exactly. He’s been leaving a fair amount of destruction in his wake that we’ve been tracking, but he’s still on the loose.”

“Keep it that way,” Steve says firmly. Her eyebrow ticks up with a corner of her lips. “I need-” he cuts himself off, taking a breath, “I need him to be okay. I need him to make it home.” Her other eyebrow rises to join the first and Steve tries not to look away. This _is_ his home now, and he wants...Bucky here. It’s Bucky’s home, too. It could be. Steve _wants_ it to be.

He keeps his eyes on hers.

“I’ll do what I can,” she says, lowering her sunglasses back over her eyes, “I want pictures when it’s born.” She smiles and his lips twitch despite himself.

“I’m only sending them to Stark,” he says, “Talk with him first.”

She pulls a face at that and Steve huffs a laugh, the tension easing a little out of his shoulders for the first time since she showed up.

“Take care of yourself, Rogers,” she says, then turns and goes without any fanfare, walking up the long length of his drive. They’re all too smart for their own good. No one gets close enough in a vehicle for him to pick it up the sound.

He’ll be more careful.

\-----

_One Month Later_

Steve tilts his head back against the back of the tube with a sigh, breathing in the lavender, cinnamon, and...two others that he can’t name, but that smell sweet, just over the line of mild. It’s enough to keep his focus, blur any thoughts but the immediate. It helps ease off the distraction of all the aches: in his lower back, his feet, his sides. He lets out a slow breath, lips twitching when he feels another kick. It’ll be soon, he thinks, really soon. 

Sam has been his pregnancy study partner, helped him root through the basket Romanoff left after checking it for bugs. They set supplies in Steve’s bedroom and Sam’s living room, the places they frequent most, or near to, just in case Steve suddenly goes into labor (and Steve keeps the gun and box of ammo nestled in at the bottom of the basket after stripping them both bare and checking them for devices, too). They’re both a bit traumatized from the birthing diagrams and videos, the c-section ones were the worst, but he’ll do what he has to.

“ _I was a pararescue_ ,” Sam had informed him before they started distributing the basket’s supplies, “ _Should come in handy, though I’ve never delivered before_.”

“ _Thanks, Sam_ ,” Steve had replied. He’d take what he could get, and an ex-military pararescue definitely sounded more helpful than both of them running around without a clue.

Steve closes his eyes and trails his fingers light over the surface of the water, floating pieces of lavender and soaked, dried flower petals brushing and bumping against his skin. He scoops them up and lets them pour out between his ruined fingers, tilting his head down and cracking his eyes open to watch. Beauty and the beast. 

There’s another kick and his eyes shift to it, lips quirking up. 

“Are you a little beast?” he jokes, and gets another kick to his gut. They’ve gotten stronger over the past few months. She’s growing, or he. 

He reaches back and blindly feels around for his phone, grabbing it off the hamper and snapping a quick selfie. Memories, moments captured for Bucky for when he gets home. Steve’s accumulated a lot. He’s glad the Stark Phone has such a huge memory drive.

He sets the phone back on the hamper and pushes himself up after the bath goes tepid, water cascading back down into the tub, the crash of it briefly filling the silence. He tugs the bath plug loose with his toes and grabs a towel, carefully stepping out. He towels his hair first, then the rest of him, leaning a little to get a better look at himself in the mirror. Maybe he should cut his hair? It’s getting pretty long. He could probably give Bucky’s _Winter Soldier_ hair a run for its money now.

He scrubs the towel over his cheek and the side of his neck, thinking. 

Is Bucky’s hair that long again now? Or did he keep it short? Maybe it’s shorter than before, more like it was during the war?

He frowns when he feels water slipping down the insides of his thighs, pulled out of his thoughts, and looks down to see it pooling on the tile floor-

“ _Oh_ ,” he breathes, “ _Shit_.” He scrambles for his phone and gets the message app opened, sending a quick one off to Sam:

_It’s time!_


	28. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOOPS. My bad guys.  
> Warnings: Minor mpreg? I tried to keep it vague.

Sam rushes over fast enough Steve’s pretty sure he broke the speed limit and a couple laws to get here. Steve manages to hobble over and unlock the front door to let him in, towel held tight below his stomach.

“Water break?” Sam asks, rushed, closing and locking the door behind him. Steve nods and makes his way back to the bedroom, hears Sam’s quick breaths and heartbeats amid numerous blinds being closed. “ _You in pain?_ ” Sam calls.

“ _Yeah_ ,” Steve calls back, slowly lowering himself down on the bed. His pain tolerance is high, at least, so it shouldn’t end up being too bad.

“How much?” Sam asks, voice getting closer.

“A little,” Steve answers, scooting back with a little difficulty towards the lower middle of the bed, shuffling onto the towels he’s had on it for the past few days, bed blankets waded up with his pillow on top for him to settle back on.

“Start timing the contractions,” Sam orders, jogging back for the kitchen. Steve hears the stove click on.

He lays back, grimacing a little when he feels one of those contractions, and starts counting. He’s going to be here for a while. At least even with everything going on and the lack of hospital, and the possibility that he might actually need to tear himself open, if something does goes wrong, his body will heal faster than most.

\--

Steve gets up every once in a while to slowly walk around the room, Sam hovering nearby but still a calming, steady presence. He brings in water and some light snacks from the kitchen, and Steve munches and drinks while he walks around, hyperaware of...everything his body is gearing up to do. It all feels strange, almost _too_ strange, so he tries not to focus on it too much.

And he tries not to think of Bucky, because the longer this goes on and the later it gets, the harder it is to think of him and not cry. And he won’t cry, not now, especially when he needs the energy for what’s coming up.

\--

The contractions last for ten, increasingly painful and uncomfortable hours, and when it finally hits the point where Steve’s gritting his elongated teeth, eyes glowing, it’s time. He’s not sure how he knows, even though he’s read countless websites about the process, he just... _knows_. It’s time.

Now. Right now.

“ _Sam_ ,” he grits out.

“Alright,” Sam replies, coming back around to the end of the bed to take a look. Steve spreads his legs a little wider, huffing a breath between the panting. He refuses to be embarrassed. “I-” Sam stops, eyes widening while he stares, “Looks like you’re giving birth the old fashioned way.” He reaches over and quickly pulls on a pair of bright yellow cleaning gloves. Steve stares. They’re so bright. “I can just barely see the top of the head,” Sam says, “At least we won’t have to cut you open.”

“So far,” Steve replies, huffing another breath that wants to be a laugh but doesn’t quite make it. “That’s something,” he grits out, curling his fingers into fists on the bed, “I’m going to push now.”

“I- Okay,” Sam says, shifting a bit. When Steve manages to glance down at him; he looks like he’s getting ready to catch a baseball.

“Which team are you pitching for?” Steve tries to joke, grunting with the strain.

Sam’s lips twitch, glancing up. “Yours. Now _push_.”

Steve grits his teeth, clenches his jaw tight, and _does_ , shuddering at the fresh, harsh wave of pain spreading up throughout his body-

He starts yelling when he feels his bones shift, like his body is coming apart in a way completely different from when he turns into a wolf, but he keeps pushing, doing his best to let the rippling pain ride its way right over him, sweat sliding down the sides of his face, dripping off his chin.

And it surprises him, shocks him out of the incessant waves of pain a little while later, between his panting and groans of effort, when he hears a high pitched wail pierce the silence of the room.

\--

“Guess what,” Sam breathes, the smell of blood and...other things in the air. That tiny voice is still wailing, loud and high enough it hurts Steve’s ears, but simultaneously brings all of his focus to it like a bell ringing in the middle of a warzone, bright and surprising for all that it doesn’t belong there, a sound foreign in the midst of battle, but no less beautiful. “You were right.”

Steve blinks a little drowsily, shaking his head quickly to try and dislodge the fatigue. Sam slowly comes around carrying a shifting bundle, and slowly, carefully kneels a knee on the bed to offer it over. He helps Steve shift his arms and hands into the right positions, and the wails soften, gradually go quiet, and then Steve’s cradling it.

 _It’s so...small_ , he thinks dazedly, so much smaller than he expected for all the effort, but so... _enormous_ , too. Sam parts the blanket a little and Steve drops his eyes to the movement.

“It’s a girl,” Sam states, lips already halfway up into a grin.

Steve’s own join in, and then he starts to laugh giddily before she starts making soft little complaints, shifting restlessly in his arms. He quickly quiets and... _melts_ , him and Sam both do. There’s no other word for it.

She has soft tufts of golden brown hair on her head, still a little dark and slick from the water Sam used to gently clean her off. She’s an angry red and her fists are balled up like she’s going to fight him, Sam, fight them both and the whole world on top of it. Who knows, some day she might.

“I love her,” Steve whispers, eyes stinging.

“Me too,” Sam whispers back. His voice sounds thick, or maybe that’s just Steve.

Steve swallows and holds her close, gently, lightly nosing at her and then brushing his forehead just as light across the top of her head, marking her. It’s easy to ignore the dull aching pain coming from all over, the residual effects of feeling like his body was splitting in two. It’s so easy.

It’s a gentle kind of quiet for several minutes before Sam asks, hushed, “You pick a name?”

Steve sighs, quiet and...happy, gazing down at her.

“No, not yet,” he answers, voice equally hushed. But he can feel it, almost on the tip of his tongue. “I’ll find it,” he says. Sam nods, and Steve manages to drag his eyes away from her long enough to tell him, “ _Thank you_.”

Sam smiles back. “You two are _very_ welcome.”

Steve smiles, and then his eyes fall back to her like falling comets, like shooting stars, pulled down by her gravity.

\-----

Steve gently rocks her while he hums, some non-thought tune that comes effortlessly, one note trickling after the other. It’s been three days, but he’s still sore, so he keeps to the bedroom, leaning back against the headboard next to the nest of blankets he’s made for her. She makes soft little gurgle sounds and he smiles, focusing on the sound of her tiny, strong heartbeat.

“Uncle Sam’s puttering around in the kitchen,” he tells her softly, reaching under a pillow for his phone, “Smells like he’s making…” Steve sniffs at the air. “Pumpkin spice and vanilla?” He taps his phone screen on, opening the saved pictures of Bucky. “This is your father.” He holds the phone up and turns it towards her. She doesn’t understand, but that’s alright. He’ll show her every day. “You don’t know him yet, but he’s beautiful, inside and out, just like you. You’ll meet him soon, I hope.”

She makes more soft noises, shifting restlessly in his arms, and Steve sets his phone down to lightly brush his fingers across her hair, then hunches down to press a kiss to her forehead.

He starts humming again, soft and low, and a little while later, she falls asleep. He snaps a quick picture of her before turning the phone screen off, letting it go dark.

 _You’ll meet him soon_ , he thinks, glancing up towards the blinds, _Soon_.

\-----

 

_Two Years Later_

 

“Hey, Barnes!”

He glances back as he heads to the locker room, unzipping his gear as he goes. It’s still a novelty that he doesn’t have to wait until he’s there and in submissive position, no hands impatiently waiting to pull at his form, to take him apart in body before taking him apart in mind.

“Coulson wants to see you,” Agent Johnson informs him. Coulson’s still slipping up and calling her Skye instead of Daisy, and Bucky refuses to call her a flower name while she’s still dressed in the uniform she sinkholed a Hydra base in with just her hands pressed to the ground. Pretty she may be, a flower all the time she is not.

“Got it,” he replies, smoothly changing direction.

He makes his way across the base to Coulson’s office, eyes darting to each agent he passes. Their’s still find him like heat seekers, linger, quietly curious and by their scent, cautious. It’s been two years of stealth missions with Quake, Mockingbird and her husband, and...Tripp, which is always an experience. The other agents on the base and outside of it are wary of him, a familiar sensation, curious about the Top Secret Missions and the Winter Soldier only being _deployed_ on the Top Secret Missions. Even though no one’s called him by that name, most of them know it’s him. A glance at his metal arm here, a peek at his metal fingers there. In a base of intelligence agents, it’s not hard to put together. The only difference really, is Tripp.

Tripp, Gabe Jones’ grandson, who approaches him each time like an old friend meets a groupie meeting a celebrity, much as he tries to hide it, an unfamiliar sensation. The friend part, anyway. Bucky wonders if Steve even knows Tripp exists, if Steve would want to meet him as Steve is now-

He locks those thoughts down ( _again_ ), dwelling on them just leads to more longing and misery.

He stops and taps the back of his knuckles on Coulson’s smoked glass door, the shapes inside shifting. Agent May comes out, not as unreadable as she likes to think she is. At least she finally stopped glaring at him like she was planning to turn his insides into a makeshift soup. He’d like to make it out of here alive, thanks.

Bucky steps in after she’s out and closes the door behind him.

“Agent Barnes,” Coulson greets, looking up from his desk as he stands. He offers out a black file and Bucky takes it warily. He slowly flips it open, eyes lingering for a moment longer on Coulson before he looks down. “Your service is complete.”

He stares, widened eyes roving over the paperwork. Cheeky bastard actually put his contract and agreements from two years ago in _writing_.

“You can go home now,” Coulson says.

Bucky’s eyes dart back up.

Coulson smiles. “Would you like Rogers’ location?”

Bucky swallows heavily and nods. He’s...he’s finally going home.

 _Steve_ , he thinks, two years of desperation bubbling to the surface. He keeps it from his face.

“Thank you for your help,” Coulson says, handing him a sticky note and dragging him out of his thoughts, “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call.”

“Thank you.” Bucky nods, taking it and slipping it inside the file, then turns and heads for the door, pulling it open and stepping out, quietly closing it behind him.

He’s going home. He’s going **_home._**


	29. Oh, my love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOOPS. GUYS. I FORGOT TO POST 28 AND POSTED 29 INSTEAD. I'M SORRY. 28 is a short, 5 page chapter but it was sUPPOSED TO HAPPEN I'M SORRY. So go back and read the one before this one holy shoot. No wonder my chapter count was off on here compared to docs fjkdsfjdskl. Wow. I forgot I was going to post them at the same time.

The bike kicks up the occasional leaf and pebbles on the way there, curving down winding roads and leaning his bike ‘round the corners to and fro, engine a comfortable roar beneath his legs. The sun paints streaks across the black asphalt, turns the yellow divider lines neon, the shadow of him cutting through all the gold. The closer he gets to ‘x marks the spot’, the faster his heart beats, no matter how he tries to settle it.

Finally, at some point, he enters the state, then past a town, another, then the mailboxes slowly start flying by. He untwists the throttle grip as he nears the next one, slowing to a gradual stop in front of it, engine coming to a rumbling idle.

Four numbers burned into his mind from a sticky note so many miles ago. They match, but there’s no ‘Rogers’ stamped on the side of the mailbox, just the digits.

He trails his eyes down the drive to the house at the end on the right. It’s big, far bigger than any place either of them have ever owned in any lifetime, or any house they’ve ever been in, including the ones in Europe. There’s a lake with a barn next to it on the left, the house, two trucks, and a motorcycle on the right-

Steve’s motorcycle.

Bucky revs the engine a little and rolls it along, slowly steering it down the long gravel drive and letting it coast down across the rocks.

He comes to a slow stop near the end, swallowing while the bike rumbles beneath him. He edges a little closer and then cuts the engine, sitting for a few moments and just staring at the house. He kicks the kickstand out and eases the bike’s weight onto it - careful to balance it on the gravel - and climbs off. He pulls his helmet up and off and waits, eyes glued to the closed blinds in the windows. All of them are closed, but he can pick up the sound of heartbeats and indiscernible whispers inside, just the faint _shush_ of them.

He waits, and waits, nerves trying to swallow him whole while the curiosity of who else is in Steve’s house burns at his insides. What if Steve isn’t actually here? What if Coulson gave him a false address? What if this is a trap? It’s not like he hasn’t been wondering the same thing for the past countless miles and roadside gas stops, but-

But if it _is_ Steve’s house, he needs to know.

The front door cracks open and he nearly jolts, fingers tightening on his helmet. Steve slowly steps out, shield in front of him in a soft sweater and jeans, barefeet bright against the brown welcome mat and hair shorter than Bucky’s ever seen it. Steve blinks, eyes widening.

Bucky’s never seen anything so beautiful.

“ _Bucky_ ,” Steve breathes. He glances around quickly and Bucky watches him scent the air because Steve’s always been smart, and then those gorgeous blue eyes are finally back on him. Just seconds away feels like lifetimes.

“I’m home Steve,” he says softly. Steve unwinds a bit at that, shield lowering some.

“Buck, are you really?” he asks. Bucky nods and Steve drops the shield easy as breathing and runs straight for him. Bucky drops his helmet and meets him halfway, gravel crunching under boot, and sweeps him up, arms wrapped tight around him while he buries his face in the side of Steve’s neck-

He pauses, pulling his head back at the wave of another scent practically layered over Steve’s like a second skin.

“It’s just Sam,” Steve says, muffled against his neck where Steve’s still breathing deep, “He’s a friend.”

Bucky buries his face back in Steve’s neck, noses at him, but there’s something else- something he can’t recognize.

Steve pulls back all at once and yanks his hand, pulling him towards the house and just barely stopping long enough to pick up the shield on the way. “There’s someone you need to meet,” he says.

“‘Sam’?” Bucky asks. Steve glances back at him but doesn’t answer, and Bucky’s always been helpless to follow him, back into the war and into the future, and now.

The inside of the house is large and homey, warm. Bucky looks around to take it all in while trying to find the source of that strange smell that hit his nose more strongly as soon as the door was open-

A man comes out from the entryway up to the left carrying a small child and hands her to Steve, easily taking the shield from him in return like they’ve exchanged them thousands of times. Steve smiles at the man and then the little girl before looking back to Bucky.

Bucky watches them, tense, eyes darting between the three of them but always coming back to Steve and her. She’s small, with dark golden brown hair, one eye brown and one eye blue. She’s-

His eyes widen, shifting between both of hers. “You…”

“Becca,” Steve says, looking back to the little girl in his arms while Bucky’s eyes dart to him, “This is Bucky.”

“ _B'gy_ ,” she says, slurring the letters a tiny bit, but it sounds familiar in her small mouth, like she’s said it more than this first try. She swivels her eyes from Steve back to him, intent, staring for what feels like an eternity. He feels like he’s being judged, harder than any Hydra handler or General’s gaze he’s been under. And then she breaks out into a big, toothy grin - some of them missing - and flails her little arms towards him. “ _Dadda!_ ” she trills.

And just like that, that one word hits him in the chest harder than any bullet ever could.

“‘Dadda’?” he asks weakly. She squeals so high and happy he winces, eyes rapidly darting between her and Steve, then to presumably Sam, who raises his hands in surrender.

“Trust me, she’s yours,” he says, and Bucky’s eyes widen a little more, slowly shifting back to the source of the tsunami wiping away all his shores.

“I’m,” Bucky says, but nothing else comes. Steve gives him a minute, bless him, and then says, soft and a little cautious, a lot hopeful, “Do you want to hold her?”

Bucky keeps staring, can’t help it, but slowly nods. Steve steps forward, steps close, and Bucky’s nose fills with his and Becca’s and Sam’s scents and he...shudders. Steve smells the same, like sunlight and warm things, like warmth, like home. She smells like him in that way, but like wet stone under sunlight surrounded by a field of flowers with Sam’s spiced scent underlying them both.

Bucky reaches up as Steve gently offers her over and accepts her like she’s made of glass, holds her small, soft body to his chest like she’s fragile porcelain and stares into her mismatched eyes as she stares up at him. Her little hands reach up, settling on his stubble-rough cheeks, pressing his overgrown bangs to his face. He tries not to tremble, but he can feel he is anyway.

“Dadda.” She grins, wide and _pleased_ , and he loves her; it’s easy.

“Hey, there,” he says, soft and shaky, eyes stinging, “Hey there, gorgeous.”

She grins wider, giggling, little hands flailing to his chest and tangling in his ponytail where it’s draped over his shoulder.

“This whole time…” he near-whispers, staring at her, dragging his eyes up to Steve, who’s watching them, sad and tired and infinitely happy, eyes as wet as Bucky’s feel.

“Yeah,” Steve answers, soft and hushed.

There’s not much else to say.

Bucky sits on the couch half an hour later, his- his little girl in his lap, looking over his clothes, all the zippers while playing with his leather jacket’s belt. He gently pulls it away when she goes to put it in her mouth, eyes shifting back up to Sam on the neighbouring armchair, Steve’s thigh pressed warm and firm against his own.

Steve’s eyes dart between them.

“So, Sam,” Bucky finally breaks the awkward silence, “How do you know Steve?”

Sam’s eyebrows twitch up but he smiles a little, like he’s amused. Bucky tries very hard not to frown, eyebrows lowering a little.

“I’m his neighbour,” Sam answers, “I met him a little after he moved in and we’ve been hanging out nearly everyday pretty much since.”

“Everyday,” Bucky says a little flatly.

“Nearly,” Sam corrects.

Bucky’s lips curl down, just a smidge. He looks over at Steve. “Are you sure she’s mine?” She flails her arms at him and Bucky snaps his gaze back to her, catching her little arms gently in his hands and leaning down to _bop_ the tips of their noses lightly together. She giggles and tries to flail at him again.

“ _Buck_ ,” Steve says, exasperated, fingers tightening around his bicep. Bucky can feel the pressure of it, if not the physical warmth. “Sam’s a friend. He helped deliver her.” Bucky’s eyes snap back up to Sam at that, trying to ignore the pang of... _jealousy_.

“Oh,” he says, and the room lapses into awkward quiet again. He looks down at Becca, blinks when he finds her already staring up at him, eyes big and fingers in her mouth. “Becca,” he tries. She grins around her fingers.

“Rebecca, after your little sister,” Steve explains softly, drawing his eyes over. Steve’s lift from her to his. “It felt...right, and like I had another piece of you here.”

Bucky swallows. “Not ‘Sarah’, after your mother?”

Steve shakes his head a little, smile softening more, somehow. Bucky melts a little more inside.

“God I missed you,” he blurts, biting the inside of his cheek after. Steve’s smile widens and Bucky feels _helpless_ for the first time in...years, a good kind of helpless. Steve leans in and noses at his cheek. Bucky turns his head to rub their cheeks together, rubbing his scent into Steve’s skin (and maybe trying to cover up Sam’s, just a bit).

“You guys want me to go?” Sam asks. Bucky blinks out of the peaceful haze trying to settle over him and looks over.

“If you want to, Sam,” Steve replies kindly.

Sam just grins and gets up, making his way to the front door. Bucky watches him go the whole way. “I’ll give you guys a chance to catch up.”

And then he’s gone, the sound of an engine starting outside and tires rolling across gravel, and it’s just them in a large house in the middle of the Vermont countryside.

Bucky stares.

That was...easy.

He looks over to Steve, who scoots down so he can rest his head on Bucky’s left shoulder, padded by his jacket, arms curling around his left. He reaches up to brush his fingers gently through Becca’s hair. Bucky watches him, then her, then him again, and settles back more into the couch, the knot that’s been wound tightly in his chest for the past two years finally starting to come undone.

He’s...home.

-

“It’s her bed time,” Steve says a few hours later, time spent holding and playing with her, marking her and Steve in his scent, touching someone without violence for the first time in over two years. Steve doesn’t move to take her from his lap, doesn’t even lift his head off Bucky’s shoulder.

After a few more minutes, Bucky slowly stands, giving Steve time to sit up first and scooping Becca up as he goes, cradling her close as she settles drowsy but restless against his chest. He rocks and bounces her gently and starts up a hum, old habits and instincts kicking in from a long, long time ago. He’s surprised that any part of him remembers, let alone both body and mind.

He hasn’t thought about his sisters much since remembering them. He didn’t want to look them up while he was in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s underground base, didn’t want people tracking him, so he’d bottled it to think about later. Now, he lets himself wonder about them, wonders if they’re still alive, wonders how old they are, if _they_ had kids, grandkids. He could be an uncle, grand uncle, _and_ a father now. They might be in hiding like he and Steve are. He might never see them again.

She starts fussing and he hushes her gently, reaches up to slide a fingertip lightly down the side of her cheek, the length of her little nose to distract her. She catches it in her tiny mouth and gnaws on it like a bone, and his lips curl up, farther than they have been for the past few hours.

“Little wolf,” he teases softly, Steve’s chest rumbling gently against his arm where Steve wraps himself back around it. Bucky feels the vibrations travel over his leather covered metal arm.

She makes soft, little gurgly sounds against his chest, one hand curling around and gripping his ponytail. He leans into Steve and the arm that curls around his waist, and goes back to humming. Steve finds the tune and joins in, chin coming to rest on Bucky’s shoulder.

They rock together, slow and gentle, buoy side to side and watch her eyelids get heavier and heavier until her mismatched eyes stay closed. They watch her for a little while, humming gone breathy to silent until Steve starts gently tugging him down the hall.

Her bed is... _in_ Steve’s bed, or one of them is. There’s a crib next to the bed on the side furthest from the windows, the shield propped up against the side of the bed between the two, but there’s a nest of blankets on that side of the bed, too, a dip in the middle roughly in the shape she’d occupy. Steve guides him over to the crib. Bucky holds onto her for a little while longer before eventually, slowly lowering her down into velvet soft blues with gold stars and crescent moons. His lips curl up watching her wiggle around and get comfortable. He leans on his forearms on the edge of the crib, Steve settling against his side.

“We made her,” Bucky whispers in awe. Steve hums a low agreement, arm looping through his and chin resting on his shoulder again. “I’m sorry it took so long to get here,” Bucky continues, turning his head to look over and swallowing, “I missed so much.”

Steve shifts a little, pulling his phone out of his pocket. After a moment of tapping at it, he hands it over and Bucky takes it, blinking down at the bright screen in the dark. Photos, tons of photos categorized by months. He starts swiping his thumb through them, eyes slowly widening while they sting.

Steve and Sam and a blonde woman in a witch hat on Halloween, Steve’s eyes glowing and Sam holding up a plastic machete, little kids dressed as superheroes, a cat on a counter, the same cat, the same cat sleeping curled up against a forearm (presumably Steve’s, based on the perspective). Steve and Sam in a kitchen, snow, the sky, trees, Steve smiling against the rim of a mug, steam caressing the air around his face, Steve pregnant, a little at first and then gradually _huge_. Steve in a bathtub, and then Rebecca, tinier than she is now and angry red, looking as feisty as Steve used to get when _he_ was small.

Rebecca and Steve, Sam holding Rebecca, the three of them grinning behind a huge flower shaped cake with one candle in the middle, the three of them grinning on her first Halloween, little whiskers painted on her chubby cheeks, Thanksgiving, snow again, Steve opening a present with Rebecca reaching for it from where she’s perched in his lap, another birthday.

Bucky’s missed _so much_.

He wipes at his eyes and wet cheeks with his fingers, sniffing quietly. He feels Steve press closer all along his side, nosing at the side of his neck.

Bucky turns into him, pulling him close and hugging him tight.

“I love you,” he whispers, “I love you both.”

Steve’s arms tighten around him, squeezing him close just as hard. “We love you too.”

Bucky holds in a rough sound, swallows it down, and buries his face into the side of Steve’s neck, shaking and trembling while Steve holds him as he falls apart, and holds him as he slowly pulls back together, always manages to keep him on his feet.

\--

A high pitched sound jolts him awake in the night, hand flying under his pillow for his gun while he tenses, listening- Something shifts next to him, an arm uncurling from around his waist-

Steve rolls up out of bed and takes a step towards the crib, leaning over the side and reaching down into it like he does this every night. Maybe he does. Bucky doesn’t know. But he’s going to. He’s _going to_.

“Hey, there. _Shh, shh_. What is it Becks?” Steve asks, soft and hushed. Bucky takes a slow breath and uncurls his fingers from around the gun, watching, transfixed.

“ _Hungry_ ,” he hears, small and warbly.

“Want some hot chocolate?” Steve asks quietly. She must nod, because he turns back to the bed and kneels on it, leaning across to press a kiss to Bucky’s cheek before pushing back off and heading down the hall.

Bucky watches him go for a moment before scooting across the bed and standing up, stepping over and leaning over the side of the crib. “How you doin’, little one?” he asks quietly, voice rougher than he’d like. He clears it.

She stares up at him for a few moments like she doesn’t know what to do with him. He can’t really blame her.

“Hungry,” she repeats quietly, sniffling once.

He raises a brow. “You’ve got him wrapped around your little finger, huh,” he says. She smiles slowly and he grins back, listening to Steve putter around in the kitchen. “Yeah, me too,” he says, “But he’s got me wrapped around _his_ finger just as bad sometimes. _Don’t tell him_ ,” he finishes in a whisper, holding a finger up to his lips. She giggles quietly.

Steve comes back about five minutes later with a warm bottle, pressing into Bucky’s side while reaching down and giving it to her.

“Chocolate milk, huh?” Bucky asks, scenting the air. Steve hums an agreement.

“She’s almost at the age where she shouldn’t use a bottle anymore, but like you said, wrapped around her finger,” Steve jokes quietly, looking over and smiling. Bucky returns it.

They stay hovering over her crib until she’s done, just watching her breathe and move, _exist,_ watching her blink slower and slower the more tired she gets again. Steve takes the bottle back when she’s finished.

“Daddy bed?” she asks, tired and hopeful.

“Not yet, sweetheart,” Steve answers softly, reaching down to pet her hair, “Let’s let Bucky get used to being in it first, okay? He’s been gone a long time.”

She blinks drowsily but nods slowly. They stay watching over her until she falls back asleep, then Steve sets the bottle on the decorative table next to the bed and they get back in it.

“The frame is beautiful,” Bucky comments, arm wrapped around Steve’s back with the comfortable weight of Steve’s head resting on his chest.

“Paid Sam to make it,” Steve replies, eyes closed, “He’s very good with his hands,” he teases. Bucky shoves gently at his shoulder and Steve huffs a tired laugh.

They curl up together. Bucky tucks his face into the top of Steve’s hair while Steve strokes his fingers through the length of Bucky’s over his shoulder, long and slow.

-

He wakes again, eyes sliding open to stare across at the crib over Steve’s head while he keeps himself still. It’s still dark out and the crib is quiet. Steve’s breathing changes a moment later, fingers tightening on the hand of Bucky’s arm wrapped around his waist.

“There’s something out there,” Steve whispers.

“Yes,” Bucky replies, other hand already up under his pillow, fingers wrapping around the gun while Steve silently reaches for his shield. They roll out of bed towards the crib one after another, barely making a sound and keeping low. Steve situates himself in front of the crib with his shield up while Bucky crouches close, gun drawn and pointed down and eyes on the windows, listening.

His heartbeat, Steve’s, Becca’s, and one...two...three, four, five outside, closing in.

He looks over and Steve looks back with a nod, pulling his phone out of his sweatpants pocket and keeping the low light behind his shield. Bucky frowns but doesn’t say anything.

_Who’s he texting?_

Bucky signs to him when he’s done and Steve nods, raising his shield slightly in a gesture. Bucky nods back and glances at the windows one more time before taking up position just outside the bedroom in the hall.

The heartbeats get closer...closer-

A window shatters in the kitchen and there’s the sound of metal rolling closer on the ground before a flash _BANG_ goes off in the hallway. Bucky quickly shields his eyes while Steve shields Becca’s eyes and ears, shield on his back and leaning over the crib. Bucky focuses his hearing and fires blindly down the hallway, hears a grunt and smells blood. There’s another _flashbang_ followed by gunshots and Bucky runs at them, using his left arm to block the bullets from his face. He _bangs_ through the front door and lights turn on, blinding him briefly, but it’s just long enough-

Something metal hits his left arm and he jolts with an electrical current, teeth rattling in his head while the world fritzes. He doesn’t realizes he’s on his hands and knees until something hits him hard over the back of the head and he lands cheek first in the gravel, hearing going garbled and wobbly but he thinks he hears Steve yelling, coming closer. A boot comes down on his right hand and digs his fingers and gun into the dirt, fingers spasming around it in pain. There’s a familiar _click_ -

Something covers him, large and warm and breathing, and he tenses, what looks like a blurry wrist next to his face and muscles pressed to his back. The audio straightens out and finally starts coming back in in a way that makes _sense_.

“- _lease!_ _Leave him be!_ ”

Steve. Above him. Steve’s covering him.

“He _took_ from us,” an old voice says, shudderingly familiar, “We’re _owed_.”

“He’s _paid_ ,” Steve spits back, anger practically thrumming against Bucky’s back. He tries to shift but Steve somehow presses down _harder_. “She’s not my first _._ ”

There’s a tense sort of quiet.

“Explain,” Rheighan orders.

Slowly, reluctantly Steve pushes himself up and his weight leaves Bucky’s back. Bucky stays where he is when Steve presses a quick hand to the back of his head, steadying.

“Wait,” Steve says, low and tense, to them and to him, Bucky thinks, then his footsteps retreat. Bucky tenses more the further he goes.

 _Don’t,_ he thinks desperately, irrationally, heart pounding in his throat and eyes glowing, nails lengthening into sharp points. The gun muzzle presses harder to the back of his head. _Don’t bring her out here_.

Steve’s footsteps return with a small, rapid heartbeat and Bucky pushes himself up on his hands half a foot before a gun muzzle roughly nudges the top of his head. He stops, curling his fingers, gravel digging into his right palm before crushing and grinding easily to dust in his left.

 _I can’t see her like this_ , he can’t see _anything_ but the bright floodlights and backlit boots and jeans without turning his head, but the _gun_ \- If he moves fast enough, he can grab it, but there’s four others to worry about. He _can’t_ with her _**right there**_.

Dumbly, he realizes he can smell the morning on the horizon. The sky will start turning gray soon.

Steve’s footsteps come to a stop next to his right hip and Bucky wants to look, but doesn’t risk turning his head. He can’t protect her if he’s dead.

“Bucky’s already paid in full,” Steve says, low and hard and hollow, jarring in the quiet of the night. The words make Bucky shudder and grit his teeth. “She’s my second. Your torture- took my first... _our_ first,” Steve continues, barely stuttering and hollowed out by the end, “Director Fury has it in my medical files.”

It’s quiet again, uncomfortable.

Fury might not actually _have_ it recorded. They’ll have to fight with her here if he-

“Call him,” Rheighan says to someone. Bucky hears movement and then the quiet _beeps_ of buttons being pushed, a tinny dial tone.

“Sir,” Keith chirps in while another hunter speaks in low tones to someone on the phone, “Agent Barton mentioned something about it before we left S.H.I.E.L.D. He wasn’t lying.”

_Quiet._

Bucky wants so badly to _look up_.

The gun muzzle eases off his head and Bucky waits a minute before slowly pushing himself up onto his knees, looking up.

There’s five hunters silhouetted by floodlights, four with their guns aimed his direction. He looks over and Steve’s standing at his side, shield on the arm holding Becca, covering her. Bucky relaxes fractionally.

Then there’s tires coming down the gravel drive and they all look up, headlights gently bobbing in the dark distance. It slows to a stop a car length away from the hunters, three of them aiming their guns at it, and then it’s quiet again, the early morning silence making it worse. The door pops opens after a minute and Sam slowly steps out, his own gun trained.

“ _Who are you?_ ” Janae demands, accent sharper.

“Friend of the family,” Sam replies calmly, “Let me take the kid back in the house, yeah?”

They let Sam close, guns trained on each other like some parody of a dumb western standoff, and Bucky watches Steve transfer Becca, Sam keeping her shielded with his body the whole time. The detail makes Bucky’s heart ache. Leave it to Steve to find and make friends with someone like that in the middle of nowhere countryside and fields of farmland.

The youngest hunter from two years ago texts someone, the button beeps sharp in the tense quiet, and then he hands the phone to Rheighan, who reads something off it. His expression eases slightly and then smoothes out altogether, gun staying trained on them. He looks over to the other hunter who’s hung up the phone and they nod.

“Looks like you’re telling the truth,” Rheighan says, looking up and handing the phone back without looking away. Keith takes it, glancing between the three of them.

Bucky keeps his expression blank.

The man just gave up the tactical advantage of the secret that they have someone, or people, inside S.H.I.E.L.D. This early morning incursion means more to them than Bucky thought it did.

“How did you find us,” Steve says more than asks.

“Tracked him,” Rheighan answers with a nod of his chin towards Bucky, and Bucky’s insides burn and shift, uneasy, _guilty_ , “Been trackin’ him off and on for the past two years, keepin’ quiet, waiting, watching. Finally came time we could act, but.” He lowers his gun and glances towards the others, Janae the last to reluctantly lower his own with a scowl. “Seems we don’t need to, as of yet.”

“‘As of yet’?” Steve asks, tensing further.

Rheighan’s eyes shift back to him. “We’ll be keeping an eye and ear out, just like we always do. You step outta line, you die. Simple as that.”

“We should kill them now,” Janae says, low and tense. Bucky tenses subtly, can feel Steve do the same impossibly further at his side.

“You know how we work,” Rheighan replies, “Don’t get cocky.” He jerks his head and all of the hunters start backing up, guns down but grips firm, ready to fire. They get ten feet back before Janae whips his gun up-

Steve moves when Janae does, wrapping himself around Bucky and throwing his shield up just before the gun goes off, bullet _pinging_ off the metal. Bucky throws his left arm up around it and fires-

He smells blood on the air and waits, tense and waiting _waiting **waiting**_ -

No shots come.

Steve glances up over the top of his shield, just a quick one before raising his head up enough again to peek over it when there still aren’t any shots. Bucky leans around the side to look, too, both their eyes glowing.

Three hunters have their hands and arms around Janae, keeping him restrained while he thrashes against their hold, yells muffled into one of their palms clamped tightly over his mouth. Keith is crouched down, looking over the bullet wound in his thigh while Rheighan watches them, eyes shifting to him and Steve.

He turns to go again and Bucky and Steve frown.

“You’re not going to retaliate?” Bucky demands, eyes flashing.

“He had his warning,” Rheighan replies, walking away, boots crunching slow and steady over the gravel.

“ _You think I can’t smell it?_ ” Bucky demands, and Rheighan stops, turning back to look at him. Bucky grits his teeth. “The wolf blood on you, _in_ you. Just how old are you? How many have died by your hands for that _longevity?_ ” he spits.

“Old enough to know not everything’s a bloodbath,” Rheighan answers steadily after a moment, “And to have a few first edition Captain America comics under lock and key.” He turns back forward and continues walking. “Those wolves died for a reason. You should think about that.”

 _Some of them died for **your** fight_ , Bucky thinks darkly, watching them all walk away, three of them still dragging Janae up the drive. They disappear into the woods across the road at the top of the drive just before the sun’s light streaks out across the land and hits his eyes, the only sign they were ever here the blood trail in the gravel still stinking up Steve’s property and the floodlights they left behind.

“He didn’t kill us,” Bucky says, low and quiet. Steve doesn’t say anything.

 _He would have before_ , Bucky doesn’t say, doesn’t have to. Either seeing Becca changed things, or he’s letting them think _something_ did.

Steve blows out a slow breath while Bucky keeps his eyes on the road, watching and waiting, just in case. After another quiet ten minutes go by, Steve’s hand settles on his shoulder and Bucky stands, watching for another few moments before looking over at him.

Steve’s mouth opens like he’s going to say something, then closes. He turns back towards the house, hand still on Bucky’s shoulder, a suggestion. Bucky moves forward to deal with the floodlights first, shutting them off, knocking them over and leaving them where they fall to be thrown away later, then starts walking back towards the house, Steve with him. They both head inside.

“Sam?” Steve calls, closing and locking the front door behind them.

Sam pokes his head out of their bedroom at the end of the hall and Bucky grits his teeth.

 _Sam is Steve’s friend, Sam is Steve’s friend, Sam is **only** Steve’s friend_ , he repeats to himself, scowling.

“Coast is clear for now,” Steve informs him. Sam nods and retreats back behind the doorframe while Bucky and Steve head towards it.

When they get there, Becca’s playing with a couple of small toy cars in a corner on the floor with the shield propped up against the joining walls to shield her, leaning against them and blocking all but her little hands and fingers and the toys from view. She peeks out when she hears their footsteps and squeals in delight when she spots them, cars forgotten while she pushes herself up and shakily runs to them on her wobbly little legs, arms outstretched.

“Daddy! Daddy!” She collides into and wraps herself around one of Steve’s calves, then lets go and does the same to one of Bucky’s, sending his heart up into his throat. He tries not to melt, but it’s a failing effort. He bends down and scoops her up, smiling at her delighted giggle.

“Hey, kiddo. How’re you doing?” he asks, brushing his cheek against hers and nosing at the top of her hair. She giggles at the feel of his stubble before going so serious it almost makes his head spin.

“Bad guys gone?” she asks, little eyebrows and mouth drawn down in a dramatic frown.

“Bad guys gone,” Steve confirms. And just like a light switch flicked, she’s grinning again, flailing an arm at Steve. He comes close, nestling in all along Bucky’s side and wrapping an arm around her.

“Ungle Sam! Ungle Sam!” she flails at him too, and Bucky tries to keep his annoyance buried. It’s fine. It’s _fine_. “Bad guys gone! Cake now?”

Steve snorts a laugh while Sam grins. Bucky just focuses on holstering his gun in the back of his pants so he can run his fingers gently through her hair. It’s so soft, he almost can’t even feel it.

“In the morning, sweetpea,” Sam replies, his own gun tucked away somewhere. Bucky looks up and Sam pauses. “Well, if your dad’s okay with it.”

Bucky frowns and looks back when Becca tries saying his name, melting again at just _that_. He needs start building better defenses or she’s going to grow up _too_ spoiled.

“Cake, B'gy?” she asks, and it’s not like he can say _no_. Not yet, anyway.

“In the morning,” he replies, still brushing his fingers through her hair. He presses a kiss to her forehead. “Sleep now.”

“Daddy bed! Daddy bed!” She flails her little arms excitedly and Bucky jerks his head back to avoid her little fists. She might be enhanced like them. The hits might actually hurt. He’ll have to ask Steve, or find out the easier way.

Bucky ducks his head to let one of them hit and blinks, looking over to Steve.

Steve smiles back, pressing a kiss to his cheek before pulling away and heading towards the closet. “Will you stay, Sam?” he asks.

“Yup,” Sam replies easily, taking the blankets and pillow Steve offers over before heading out to the living room. “I’ll cover the two broken windows, too.”

“ _I’ll come help_ ,” Steve calls down the hall, pausing when he realizes Bucky’s frowning at him. “I need this, Buck,” he says quietly. Bucky studies him for a moment before nodding. Steve nods back with a small smile before going out to help Sam.

Bucky looks back to Becca, then the bed, then down at his clothes. “How ‘bout I take a quick shower first, alright?” he asks, looking at her.

She gurgles at him, which he takes to be close enough to ‘ _yes_ ’.

-

After the shower and changing into some clothes Steve’s apparently been saving for him for a while (and another pang of guilt hits him in the chest, but he _deals with it_ ) and Steve and Sam get the windows boarded, and Sam situated in the guest bedroom in the first door on the right out of their bedroom, Bucky curls up with Steve and Becca in bed, Becca curled up between them up by the pillows, both with a hand resting on her small, sleeping form, her soft blankets tucked up around her, almost as soft as her hair.

“They know about her now,” Bucky says quietly. He keeps the anger out of his voice, but Steve must hear it anyway. He always hears it, even if he doesn’t remember always being able to.

“I know,” Steve replies, just as quiet, and resigned. He pets his hand down her side and then back up, feeling her steady heartbeat throughout her body under his palm. “It was a risk I had to take. I couldn’t lose you. Either of you. I didn’t want her to lose you either.”

It’s quiet for a minute.

“We could always move,” Steve suggests.

Bucky shakes his head. “No. This is your home, _our_ home, her home and Sam’s. We’re not going anywhere.”

Steve’s quiet for a moment, before teasing, “Thought you didn’t like him.”

Bucky huffs quietly and Steve laughs, low and breathy. “I don’t like that he was here for everything I couldn’t be,” Bucky says, “But I’m glad he was, too.”

Steve smiles across at him. “I hope you two will get along.”

“Doubt it,” Bucky replies easily, rubbing his thumb over Becca’s back, “But we’ll work together. For you and her.”

Steve concedes that with a nod. It’s a conversation for later, anyway.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Steve whispers after a little bit, settling his hand over Bucky’s on her side. Bucky shifts his own and slots their fingers together, watches their hands gently rise and fall with her little breaths. He looks up at Steve.

“Me, too,” he whispers back. Steve pushes up a little and leans forward and Bucky meets him halfway, kissing him over the top of Becca.

 _I’m home_ , he thinks again, and it’s an easier truth, now.


	30. We could be heroes, me and you

Bucky wakes with a small jolt in the morning, or noon? It smells like noon, the sun midday high and trying to blaze everything beneath it. He’s warm, comfortable, even when he remembers last night. He rolls over and wraps himself around Steve’s back, inhaling his scent at the back of his neck. It still smells a bit like Sam, but Bucky’ll have it covered up soon. He peers over Steve, looking for Becca before he picks up the sound of her giggles coming from the kitchen with the smell of cooking pancakes. _Sam_ , he thinks, and relaxes again, nosing at the back of Steve’s neck and smiling at the soft little groan it gets him.

“Is that a knife in your pocket or is your morning wood happy to see me?” Steve mumbles around a yawn, a smile in his voice.

Bucky noses at him again, tracing the tip of his nose across Steve’s hairline and making him shudder. “If I said both?”

Steve rolls over and Bucky gives him the room to, anything if it means Steve’s gorgeous, sleepy blue eyes are on his.

“I’d tell you to put the knife under the pillow and c’mere.” Steve smiles and loops an arm around the back of Bucky’s neck, pulling him close. Bucky does as he’s told to the sound of Steve’s low laugh, sliding his arm around Steve’s waist after and pulling him closer still, giving him a close-mouthed kiss. Steve pouts a little when Bucky pulls back and Bucky huffs a laugh.

“I love you beyond the end of time, but I’m drawing the line at morning breath.” He noses at Steve’s cheek, who finally relents with a small huff, humming and nosing back at Bucky.

“Sam’s got her,” Steve whispers, “Brush our teeth and have a makeout session in three?”

Bucky gives him another kiss and then rolls out of bed in answer while Steve rolls the opposite way with a quiet laugh, hurriedly meeting him in the bathroom. The size of it still makes Bucky a little dizzy, especially since he’s spent the last two years in an underground S.H.I.E.L.D. base in what amounts to a supply closet.

Steve digs out a new toothbrush for him, they split the toothpaste, and get to work. Within two minutes they’re both running back and hopping over the bed’s end frame, bouncing briefly until the mattress settles under their weight. Bucky gets his arms around Steve at the same time Steve gets arms around him and they kiss, kneeling on the bed, open mouthed but soft and Steve sighs.

“That’s better,” he says, and Bucky kisses him again.

Yeah, yeah it is.

Bucky nudges Steve down to the bed and lays over him, settling his weight between Steve’s legs when Steve spreads his thighs. Bucky sighs again, pleased and content at so much warm contact. “I haven’t fucked anyone since you,” he breaks the kiss to mumble down against Steve’s neck, pressing and sucking kisses into his skin. Steve’s warm there and smells like sleepy, lazy morning sunlight.

Steve huffs a breath, digging his fingers a bit into Bucky’s hips and rolling his own beneath them, making Bucky’s breath hitch. “Me neither.”

“Must’ve been _awful_ ,” Bucky teases, gently biting at Steve’s neck and making Steve’s breath hitch around his laugh, hips giving a little jerk against Bucky’s. Bucky can feel he’s hard between them, too. It makes his mouth water. He pulls back after a minute to check. “Are you _sure_ Sam’s got her?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Steve answers, dragging him down for a harder kiss, teeth tugging at his lower lip before letting go, “Now get the door.”

Bucky’s barely off of Steve for two seconds, just long enough to get the door quietly closed before he’s settling back over Steve and kissing him again and again and again, groaning faintly when Steve pulls his ponytail out and digs his fingers deep up into his hair.

“S’longer than it was when I found you,” Steve mutters between kisses. Bucky gives him a final one before trailing them to the corner of his mouth, to his chin, down the side of his neck.

“‘Ll’give you something to hold onto,” Bucky replies, kissing down Steve’s collarbone, his chest over his shirt, lower. He doesn’t waste any time with teasing or foreplay, just pulls the tops of Steve’s sweatpants and boxers down and swallows down his cock. He’s been hungry for him for _years_.

Steve moans and lets out a short, sharp shout, fingers gripping and tightening in his hair. “ _Bucky_ ,” he pants, chest already heaving on a whine when Bucky pushes himself down as low as he can, sucking and licking like he’s starving and jacking his fist on what he can’t fit in his mouth, grip firm and fast. He moans around Steve’s cock when Steve’s fingers tug and yank at his hair. “ _Fuck_ , Bucky, I’m not gonna- I’m gonna-” Steve pants, breathy.

Bucky holds his hips down and keeps going, even when Steve comes with a longer shout and he has to swallow. He sucks and licks and strokes until Steve starts to go soft on his tongue, making himself ease up and pull off when Steve starts pulling at his hair in a different kind of earnest.

Steve pulls and Bucky moves back up, surrendering to Steve plunging his tongue into his mouth.

“ _Fuck me_ ,” Steve pants, pulling back just enough to look up at him.

“That too,” Bucky replies, kissing him once, “But I’m gonna make love to you first.”

Steve’s cheeks go a little more pink, hands gentling on him, and Bucky reaches down to push Steve’s pants and boxers off, feels Steve’s hands slide down to do the same to his. They shift and wiggle around, kicking out of their clothes and tossing their shirts aside to join the rest.

“God, you’re beautiful,” Steve says quietly, reverently. Bucky’s cheeks warm a bit and he bends down, sharing a kiss.

He doesn’t intend to tease, but he does press kisses down Steve’s side, across his chest, licks and sucks at each of Steve’s nipples to the sound of Steve’s moans until Steve’s tugging at his hair again, and Bucky moves lower, pressing kisses to his stomach, sucking them into his hips. He can smell that Steve’s wet. It’s not as sweet or as strong as it was when he was in heat, but it’s still one of the best things he’s ever smelt.

He gently spreads Steve’s legs and shudders at the first heady whiff of it, cock hard and mouth watering. He ignores his own ache to press loving, gentle kisses to Steve’s inner thighs, the sides of his knees, his calves, humming softly into Steve’s skin as Steve’s fingers gently stroking through his hair, careful of any tangles.

Bucky tries to resist, but he can’t help dipping his head down as he spreads Steve’s cheeks, drawing his tongue in a long stripe up between them, licking his lips after Steve moans softly and squirms a little. Bucky makes a groan crossed with a low growl behind his teeth and Steve’s fingers tighten in his hair as he spreads his legs wider, eyes glowing when Bucky glances up, Steve watching down the length of himself. Bucky can feel his own glowing, too.

He manages another long slide of his tongue, groaning into Steve’s skin while Steve moans, fingers spasming gently in his hair, and then those fingers are pulling him up, past Steve’s hardening cock and to his lips. Bucky kisses him slow and sweet while Steve’s tongue slides over his own, his elongated teeth, a low moan rumbling past Bucky’s throat.

“Please,” Steve whispers against his mouth, so sweet, and Bucky can’t and doesn’t _want_ to say no.

He leans on his left forearm next to Steve’s head and reaches down with his other hand, guides the tip of his cock to Steve’s entrance, slowly pushing inside, groaning low in his throat at the smooth, wet slide. Steve’s always so _hot_ inside, every time, like he’s been laying out in the sun and become one with the light, one with solar flares and the center of exploding starlight, so impossibly hot compared to how frozen Bucky’s been for years.

He slides his hand up Steve’s trembling leg while panting out his name, Steve moaning Bucky’s back. Steve’s fingers tighten in his hair, grip it, the others finding and digging into his shoulder.

“Fuck, _Bucky_ ,” Steve pants. Bucky leans down to kiss him again, both of them moaning once Bucky’s all the way in. He stays there for a minute, breaking the kiss to rest his forehead down against Steve’s, absorbing the moment, the sunlight coming through the windows, the sound of two sets of laughter from further in the house, the smell of him and Steve together. Steve’s trembling legs shift and wrap around his waist and Bucky opens his eyes, slowly rocks his hips, watching Steve the whole time, the way his eyebrows tangle up and his eyelids slip halfway shut, the way his mouth opens on no sound, the feel of Steve’s fingers curling in his hair.

“Beautiful,” Bucky breathes, shuddering at another wave of pleasure, rocking his hips, “You’re always so damn beautiful.”

Steve flushes further, down past his neck, legs tightening around Bucky’s waist. “Make love to me,” he says, breathy, and Bucky pulls out a bit further before sliding back in, gentle and smooth. He runs his fingers through Steve’s hair, kisses him again, just as gentle.

He keeps it up nearly the whole while, trading kisses, makes it last even as he gradually speeds up when Steve starts getting close, when Steve’s moans come with every thrust and he starts clinging harder, nails digging into Bucky’s skin, pulling sharply at his hair. Bucky makes him come first before following Steve over the edge, breaking the kiss and clamping his teeth shut tight to keep from biting like his whole _body_ wants to, lurching forward slightly with the need of it. After, when they’re both panting and trembling, he stays where he is, just trying to breathe against the side of Steve’s neck, teeth aching, lulled by Steve’s fingers carding gentle and repetitive through his hair.

It’s quiet for a little while, just the sounds of their breathing and the muffled ones of Becca and Sam in the kitchen.

“Hey, Buck,” Steve near whispers. Bucky twitches his head up, just enough to let Steve know he’s listening. Steve’s fingers don’t stop. “Will you bite me?”

Bucky lifts his head and looks up at that, eyes steady, serious. “Now?” he asks, because he will, he _wants_ to, has for a long while, he just needs to be sure.

Steve watches him for a moment and nods, and Bucky leans up slightly to kiss him again, lets it linger before slowly trailing his lips down across his chin, back to the side of his neck. He keeps going until he finds the perfect spot, until his body tingles a bit and his teeth ache more sharply, and presses a gentle kiss to it before looking back up for confirmation. Steve nods again and Bucky bends his head back down, parting his teeth.

He bites down, keeps doing it until he feels and tastes a small rush of warmth, bloody salty on his tongue, hears Steve suck in a little breath, grip tightening on him again. Bucky clenches his teeth down a little harder then pulls back, licking over the wound, and once it stops bleeding, he pushes himself up over Steve, feels Steve’s eyes on him. Bucky stretches up over him and lengthens his neck out, tilting his head to the side to give him access. Steve’s fingers slide down from his hair and stroke lightly down the length of the side of his neck, and it’s quiet again. Then he feels and hears Steve shift up, hears him pull in a breath-

Teeth dig down into his flesh where neck and shoulder meet, a mirror of where he marked Steve, and he sucks in a little breath. As soon as he feels Steve’s teeth break his skin, Bucky closes his eyes. It’s done. They’re bonded.

Steve’s tongue laps at the wound until it’s clean and Bucky shudders a little.

 _Home_. This means home, too.

“Now I’m yours,” Bucky says quietly, settling down again and looking down at him, Steve staring back up, “Not Hydra’s, not those hunter’s, yours. Always been yours.”

“And I’m yours,” Steve replies softly with a small smile, brushing Bucky’s bangs aside and letting them fall back down to rest against Bucky’s cheek, “Not S.H.I.E.L.D.’s, not anyone’s but yours, Buck. Always. Forever.”

“Forever,” Bucky whispers, leaning down to gently brush the tips of their noses together, “That’s a long time.”

Steve’s lips twitch. “So is seventy years. I think we’ll be fine.”

Bucky smiles back, then leans down just that little bit further to kiss him again, Becca’s laughter in his ears from down the hall, outside the door.

 _Forever_ , he thinks, _Just this, forever. That’s all I want_.

\-----

“Hey,” Bucky says, catching Steve brushing his teeth before bed, “I have...something.” He offers over the journal he’s been carrying around the world with him, trying not to shuffle his feet like he’s giving his grade school crush a love letter all over again. “You gave me photos, I have...words.”

Steve blinks at him before bending down to spit in the sink, finishing up his teeth and putting his toothbrush away before turning to Bucky fully, eyes on the journal. He reaches for it, slow, leather smooth and worn under his fingers, and warm. Bucky’s been thinking about this for a while. It passes deceptively easy out of Bucky’s grip and into Steve’s, fingers brushing and Bucky’s trailing down the spine of it before letting go altogether.

“I wrote every day,” Bucky says quietly, “Sometimes just a word, sometimes a sentence or paragraphs. This is my...past two years.”

Steve drags his eyes up from it to Bucky, giving him a light smile. “Do you want me to read it alone?”

“Or while I’m sleeping,” Bucky suggests, leaning into kiss the corner of Steve’s mouth. “Either or.” He backs up and heads to the bed, leaving Steve standing there watching him, eyes dropping back to the journal as he lifts it. It’s thick.

-

Steve perches against the back of the headboard while he reads, Bucky sleeping silent out of the corner of his eye, and turns the next page, backs of his eyes and nose stinging. He tries to keep quiet when the tears eventually come, sooner rather than later, sniffling quietly and rubbing the back of his hand against his nose. The third page starts with:

‘ _My name is Bucky_.’

\-----

They walk up to the front door and give it a few knocks. Well, Clint does. Natasha keeps her hands in her coat, burrowing a little into the fur lining the collar from the hood with a pleased little tilt to her lips. It takes a minute before she hears anything, but then there’s nails clacking against wood and a gentle thump against the door. They share a glance before staring at the door handle. She sends him another look Clint and he sighs.

“If I die, you can have Luck-”

“No,” she cuts him off. He makes a face and twists the door handle, slowly pushing it open.

There’s no one, except a nearly overwhelming smell of _wolf_ and _pumpkin spice_ that hits her nose, making it scrunch up a little. Clint smirks, taking a cautious step inside. They toe off their shoes before looking around, eyes roaming over the living room, the kitchen, before finally settling on the hallway up ahead.

Clint reaches the room at the end before she does and she leans around him when she hears him gasp, eyes sweeping the room quickly before settling on a mound of...fur? A rising and falling mound of fur and skin in a pile on the bed. Bucky turns his head to glance back over his shoulder, one gray-blue eye watching them for a moment before closing again, head settling back down on the mattress as he curls up, naked, while a light blonde, _wolf_ Steve pushes up onto two big paws, letting out the biggest dog yawn Clint’s ever seen. So many _teeth_. The only thing saving his and Nat’s eyeballs is his shaggy tail draped over the _Winter Soldier’s_ butt.

“Wow, who knew that-” Clint cuts off with a _squeak_ and an, “ _Oh my God_.”

A little ball of golden brown fur wiggles up out of the middle of the pile and shakes itself out, walking wobbly over Bucky’s shoulders before landing on the bed, quirking its head to the side with its ears raised, one blue and one brown eye on them. Clint lets out another quiet squeak.

“Oh my God,” he says again.

Steve bends his head down to lick once at Bucky’s cheek before hopping over him altogether and landing silently on the floor, shaking himself out. The pup hops down to the floor, too, less gracefully and a lot louder, and mimics him. Clint covers his mouth with his hands, eyes wide and practically vibrating in place. Natasha can feel it, and holds in a smirk.

Bucky sits up with a low _sigh_ like the world’s disappointed him, which it probably has, more than once, and stands from the bed, stretching his arms up and arching his back before rubbing his hand across his face, looking down at Steve and the pup blearily before turning a tired glare on Natasha and Clint. He walks over - Clint tensing in place - and trudges past them, Steve padding along and the pup trotting to keep up, sniffing at Clint’s ankle before running to catch up with Steve, tripping once over its little legs.

“Nat,” Clint whispers, staring after them, eyes wide, “I have never seen anything so cute in my life. Help me.”

She pulls a hand out of her pocket to pat his head, then moves to follow them down the hall. She noticed the bite mark on Barnes’ shoulder and raises her brows a little.

Interesting.

Barnes moves naked around the kitchen, putting a pot of water on and flicking the switch on the electric kettle, crossing his arms and leaning his hip against the counter. Steve takes a seat on the floor next to him while the pup bumps into Barnes’ ankles with quiet little barks and nips. Barnes looks down at it before bending down and picking it up, cradling it. He nuzzles it before it snuggles up into the side of his neck, face disappearing into his dark forest of hair.

“You didn’t tell us your kid would be so _cute_ ,” Clint croaks, taking a seat on the other side of the counter. Natasha takes the one next to him. “I can’t even _care_ about you being naked.”

Barnes slants his eyes over. “Embarrassed?”

“Aroused,” Clint corrects, eyebrows high, “Or I would be if I could think past _how cute your kid is,_ oh my _God_.”

Barnes smirks, rubbing a hand gently up and down her back, fur ruffling and then flattening on the way up and then down. Her furry little tail wags against Barnes’ arm and Clint feels like he’s going to _die_. Or like he’s living for the first time. It’s a toss up. One or the other, there is no in between.

The kettle clicks off and Barnes pours them one handed what smells like pumpkin spice _tea?_ Somehow. Clint’s eyes almost roll back in his head when he takes his first sip, letting out a long sigh as the heat coils through his bones. “Get me the name of your dealer,” he says, taking another sip.

“He lives up the road,” Barnes replies quietly, taking a sip of his own, pup still cradled against his chest with Steve curled up on the floor next to his ankle.

“Looks like we came at a bad time,” Clint says, nodding towards them both.

Barnes looks down at his daughter and then to Steve, rubbing his ankle against Steve’s cheek and huffing a breath when Steve just noses at it with a lick and then goes back to sort-of napping on the floor. “You can come back later when we’re all more awake.”

Clint perks up, just a little, trying to keep the rest of the perking-up inside. “We’re definitely coming over for a Summer barbeque and New Years.”

Barnes huffs again while Natasha’s lips curl up against the edge of her mug.

\-----

Steve stills in the kitchen a couple days later when he catches an approaching sound, mug halfway to his mouth. He’s only heard it a few times, but it’s unique enough that he would recognize Tony’s suit repulsors anywhere. First Natasha and Clint and now Tony. So much for living quietly.

He wants to live quietly, but maybe it’s a good thing they can’t. He doesn’t doubt S.H.I.E.L.D.’s still keeping an eye on him from a distance, and the hunters flat out told him they would be doing similar. They’re probably having turf wars over the best perches and observing locations. But if Natasha and Clint visit, if _Tony Stark_ randomly drops by, that makes it harder to take out a secret Captain America and Winter Soldier and their child, all in hiding. They go from being easier targets to harder ones. As much as Steve wants his quiet, country life, it might be safer for all of them if it wasn’t, especially for Becca. At least then, she’ll finally get to go into town, and interact with his...friends. He’ll have to apologize to Sam for all of the upcoming chaos with a pair of those mechanical wings Sam was reminiscing about last New Years.

“ _Rogers! Are you okay!?_ ” he hears Tony shout outside, footsteps running up and a fist banging loudly on his front door when the door handle rattles, doesn’t turn, “ _Romanoff and Barton said you’d been_ _**attacked**_ \- _Why don’t you ever **call**_ -” He cuts off when the door opens, Sam’s steady heartbeat standing sentry. “...You’re not Rogers,” comes Tony’s voice, clear from the muffle of the door, full of suspicion.

Steve’s lips twitch against his mug, eyes sliding shut as the warmth tumbles down.

“No I’m not,” Sam replies easily, “Name’s Sam Wilson.”

“Ah yes, the neighbour,” Tony replies primly. There’s a beat of silence before he blurts, “ _That’snicewhere’sRogers?_ ”

There’s the soft sound of the hinges as the door opens wider and then slow, suspicious steps, then Sam’s quiet, “ _Shoes off, Mr. Stark_.” There’s a _thud...thud_ and then the door closing, Sam’s steady heartbeat and Tony’s quicker one heading his direction. Steve looks up.

Tony stares at him for a solid five seconds. That says a lot. “...Yeah, I can _see_ that you’re in dire danger, sipping your-” He sniffs at the air like he can tell as much about it as Steve can, “ _Homemade_ pumpkin spice latte?” he asks, eyes darting around, probably looking for a labeled coffee cup from the local chain to make sure.

“And gingerbread,” Sam pitches in, Tony’s head whipping around to him while Sam heads for the pans on the stove, “Want some? Barnes’ll be out for another few.”

Steve focuses his hearing, eyes roaming up while he listens. “He’ll be home soon.” It still gives him a thrill, saying that, _home_. Bucky’ll be _home_ soon.

“Better than Starbucks?” Tony asks, taking a seat at the counter like Steve does at Sam’s.

“ _Much_ better,” Sam answers, sounding and looking a little offended. Steve quirks a smile over at him and Sam smiles back, turning back to the stove and the drinks kept heated in the pans.

“Alright, hit me up,” Tony replies, and Steve walks over to grab another mug.

\--

Tony chatters away in the interim, talks about Pepper and the Tower and Bruce once blowing up a whole R&D floor (or twice) and the Hulk rampaging for a good half hour. Steve doesn’t need to say anything, Sam either, mostly. Tony asks the typical questions: how they met, where Sam’s from, if he likes the bike. Steve’s eyebrows rise and Tony shrugs, says, “He obviously rode it over here. It’s parked out in the driveway next to yours.” Then Steve hears running and hopping steps preceding the sound of the back door opening, then Becca’s delighted, gleeful giggle and smiles, pushing himself up off of leaning on the counter. He melts while Tony freezes, Tony’s eyes widening and looking like a deer in headlights when Bucky walks in with Becca, hand in hand, mug frozen halfway to his mouth. Fortunately, Sam is the singularity that doesn’t get caught up in emotion and is already moving around the counter to grab Tony’s mug before it slips from his fingers and hits the floor.

Tony’s body goes slack then gives a weird, jerk-spasm-jolt.

“Child!” he lets out, pointing at her. Bucky picks her up and Becca blinks back at Tony curiously from Bucky’s arm. Bucky doesn’t break his stride, just walks over and leans in to give Steve a quick kiss before heading for the fridge, pulling out her sippy cup and handing it to her.

Tony’s silent for a solid minute, just staring while Sam takes a sip of his tea, glancing between them. Finally:

“You _adopted_ without _telling me?_ Rogers!”

Sam snorts while Steve corrects, “Didn’t adopt.”

Tony stares. Bucky gets a kick watching realization dawn on Stark’s face.

“ _No_ ,” Tony says, processing, “You _**gave birth?**_ ” he nearly shouts, voice rising to a pitch that has Bucky and Steve wincing and Becca giving a small whine. Bucky covers her ear closest to Tony and presses a kiss to her forehead while she looks up at him, drinking from her cup. “ _Without telling me?!_ ”

Bucky kisses Steve’s cheek quick on his way out and heads across into the living room.

“Um,” Steve says intelligently, dragging his eyes back from Bucky’s retreating back to Tony, “Yes?”

“Wait,” Tony says, straightening up, low and serious, “Does this mean I’m the godfather? _Can I be the godfather?_ ”

“Well…” Steve trails off, glancing at Sam, “Sam helped me deliver her and has been here since I moved here, so he’s the godfather.”

“Then I’ll be godfather two!”

Steve hears Bucky snort from the living room, followed by Becca’s soft voice lilting up in a quiet question.

“You just want to be named after a classic movie title,” Sam teases over the lip of his mug.

Tony points at him. “You are not wrong, but it’s not the only reason.”

Steve and Sam both give him a unison, disbelieving, “ _Mmhmm._ ” Bucky snorts again, punctuated by Becca’s laughter.

\--

Tony leaves after another two hours. He finds out about Sam’s wings after the first and spends the entirety of the second drilling Sam about specs and working up drafts on his phone while they huddle together on the couch.

Steve and Bucky stare, then glance at each other. Steve just shrugs and Bucky easily goes back to focusing on Becca.

After Tony leaves, Sam follows a few hours later, gladly helping them wear out Becca in time for bed. Steve surges in for a hug at the last minute before Sam goes, even though he can smell Bucky’s annoyance. Bucky’s steps retreat down the hall with Becca in his arms.

“Just...thank you, Sam,” Steve says quietly, muffled into Sam’s shoulder, “For everything. We couldn’t have done this without you. I couldn’t.”

Sam hugs him back just as tightly, thumping his back solidly a few times. “You’re _welcome_. Thank _you_ for bringing amazing things into my life.”

Steve pulls back and they share a smile. “Goodnight, Sam.”

“Goodnight, Steve,” Sam replies softly.

Steve closes the door after him and watches him go, makes sure he leaves the property okay before heading to the bedroom, where he finds Bucky leaning on his forearms on the edge of Becca’s crib. Steve heads over and sidles up next to him, finds Becca asleep when he gets there and melts all over again.

“So Hydra’s really gone?” he quietly asks after a little while. He feels Bucky glance over and looks back. “I know you wouldn’t have come back yet if they weren’t.”

Bucky nods. “Yeah. They’re gone.”

 _We’re free_ , Steve hears in the silence.

“What’re we gonna do with her?” Bucky asks gently, nodding his chin down to her.

“Well,” Steve starts, “She’ll need to start schooling in a couple years. I was thinking of homeschooling her. And I need to take her into town with me at some point since she’s never been, even though it terrifies me, thinking of people finding out about her. She needs the interaction, though, and I kind of miss it.” He takes a breath. “I was trying to wait, until it no longer looked like I was pregnant and she had more control over her changing.” He looks over. “Maybe you’d like to keep helping her with it?”

“Yeah,” Bucky answers immediately, “I’d love to. I _want_ to.” He looks back down at her. “Any time I get to spend with her feels…”

“Like a gift,” Steve finishes for him quietly. Bucky looks back with a small curl of his lips.

 _And it’ll be nice_ , Steve thinks, as Sam has told him before, for them to do something with themselves that _heals_ and _helps_ , rather than them fighting and building walls inside themselves. To raise her, instead of breaking their bodies for the world over and over and over.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. will be watching, and the hunters will keep tabs,” Bucky says seriously, brows lowered.

“I know,” Steve sighs, “But I don’t want to isolate ourselves or her forever. And if she’s anything like either of us, she won’t stand for it anyway.”

Bucky huffs a breath. “True,” he concedes with a small smirk. Steve reaches over and takes his flesh hand, threading their fingers together.

“But she won’t be alone,” he says quietly, firmly.

Bucky squeezes his hand back. “Never.”

They watch her for another while before moving over to their bed, curling up together. Steve watches Bucky while Bucky watches him, two halves curled up together to become a whole, hands held and fingers twined together between their chests. There’s still things to work out, and it’s not going to be easy, but they’ll figure it out. For the first time in a long time, they’re together, and for the first time in a long time, they both have something to look forward to.

\-----

He didn’t really remember for a long time, that there was a boy he loved who he shouldn’t have.

Bucky looks over to Steve at his side, arm around Steve’s waist and Becca in Steve’s arms, both of them glowing from the warm, gentle light reflecting off of the window while Steve points out at the snow and explains to her about something that’s outside. It sounds like it’s a group of deer traveling across their property for the Winter. Steve smiles down at her when she repeats him, eyes focused and intent out the window, then looks back at Bucky.

“I love you,” Steve says softly.

Bucky smiles. “I love you, too.”

“Me too!” Becca pitches in, looking back and up at both of them.

“Yes, you too,” Bucky replies with a smile, him and Steve pressing a kiss to the top of her head. She grins wide, her canines little points. “We love you, too.”

But he never really forgot, either. Neither of them did.

 

The End

\-----

Epilogue

 

Keith leans against the back side of the truck, glancing towards the muffled yelling coming from the shed. He winces when he hears a sharp _crack_. He loves his brother, but he’s always so angry.

He digs his private cellphone out of his pants pocket and flips it open, sending a text.

_Know if Shield’s looking for any new hunters?_

He gets one back five minutes later:

_Fuck no. But I can put you up in Bed-stuy if u need a place_

And then another:

_Got a dog needs watching_

Keith’s lips curl up. He looks back towards the shed then down at his phone, tapping out a reply.

Maybe it’s time for a little walkabout, a break from his family and this life.

\-----

Steve curls around Becca and laughs with her the whole way down, keeping her firm against his stomach as they stream down the hillside. He picks up the sled once they slow to a stop at the bottom and play-races Becca back up to the top, her little green hat with snowflakes almost neon against the backdrop of sunlit snow.

“Your turn Daddy!” she calls.

“Alright! Let’s do it!” Bucky replies, grinning. Steve hands him the sled with a quick kiss and trades places at the top of the hill.

“Cider and lunch is ready!” Sam calls over from the truck, Lindy handing him a steaming mug with besotted smile.

Steve gives them a thumbs up before turning back around to Bucky and Becca, watching them get situated on the sled. “You guys ready?”

“Aaaalmoooost- yes,” Bucky answers, left hand gripping the edge of the sled tight and right arm keeping Becca firmly against his abdomen, her little hands gripping his pant legs tight.

“Let’s go let’s go!” she wiggles a bit. Steve gives Bucky’s back a push and watches them edge down the hill, picking up speed as they go and smiling at her excited, “ _Yaaaay!_ ” and Bucky’s, “ _Woohoo!_ ” Steve’s heart swells.

Sam comes over and hands him a steaming cup that smells bittersweet and spiced with cinnamon and Steve takes a slow sip, closing his eyes with a sigh. “Thank you. You should open a bed and breakfast.”

“Been thinking about it,” Sam replies easily, looking back at Lindy perched on the edge of the backseat of the truck, legs gently kicking out over the snow while she blows on her steaming cider, “Lindy’s great with coffee and breakfast foods.”

Steve sighs forlornly to the sound of Bucky’s steps coming up the hill side. “Now if only Buck could cook as good as either of you.”

“You’re one to talk,” Bucky quips back, carrying Becca under his arm where she giggles and squirms, legs and arms squirming in the air over the snow, sled in his other hand. He drops it and reaches over to toss her up into the air, Becca screeching in delight before he catches her, smiling. “Your daddy can’t even make a sandwich without catching the toaster on fire,” he coos at her. She giggles again.

“Toaster go _boom!_ ” she throws her arms up.

“That was _one time_ ,” Steve stresses, cheeks hot, “ _Geeze_. Both of you.”

Becca giggles while Bucky smirks, leaning in for a kiss, lips pouted out dramatically. Steve playfully shoves him back with a laugh before grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him in, careful of Becca, kissing him over the top of her head.

“Love you even though you can’t cook,” Steve teases softly against his lips.

Bucky grins. “‘Till the end of the line.”

“‘Till the’...” Steve trails off, blinking when the line _clicks_ somewhere in his head. He doesn’t know where or when it’s from, or how, but he knows what it means, like an instinct. Bucky’s expression is tense, but melts again when Steve agrees, softly, “‘Till the end of the line.” Bucky smiles and leans in to kiss him again.

Becca’s little hands patting their chests draws them apart, after.

“Daddy, food,” she pouts, “No more kissing.”

Steve looks to Bucky who grins and they both duck down, each pressing a kiss to her cheeks and wiping her pout away when she laughs.

They follow a smiling Sam back to Lindy and the truck. She waves with a big smile while they leave the sled on the snow. It’s her and Sam’s turn next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it folks! I hope you've enjoyed this story. I'm glad I was finally able to finish it, and I hope it was satisfying for others to read. 
> 
> Thank you to Mari_Knickerbocker, who is responsible for hunter!Clint being in the story, and thank you to SoldierLostInTime for reminding me of the Bond/Mating! I was going to say this earlier but I kept forgetting fdjskl.
> 
> And thank you to Kay for betaing for me all this time. ;-; Honestly it's been a pleasure and I've enjoyed rambling with you about this story at odd hours, because of our time differences XD (and some _regardless_ of the time because I'm a night owl heathen fdjskl). Thank you very much.  <333
> 
> P.S. I've added the story playlist to the top of the first chapter, if anyone wants to check it out.


End file.
